An update (at last!)
I guess all bloggers go through this stage. The stage where, for a long time, they do not have anything to blog about. Unless they’re the type of bloggers who blog about what they did every single day, in which case they naturally would have loads of things to say. Because, their lives are interesting.
Castello
A few weeks ago, I watched the Malay movie Castello on VCD. The movie was directed by Bade Hj Azmi, who had directed movies like Berlari Ke Langit and Gangster.
If I’m not mistaken, Berlari Ke Langit was his debut effort. I watched it last year, at a time when my impression of Malay cinema was less than encouraging. This was before movies like Sepet, Gol dan Gincu and the works from genius director Afdlin Shauki gave me hope.
And I liked Berlari Ke Langit when I watched it. It had a simple storyline but what strengthened the movie was the bond between the protagonist (played by Rosyam Nor) and his brother. The movie proved to me that for a film to be enjoyable, it need not be complex. A simple story will work if it is told the right way.
I think somewhere along the line, Mr. Bade started to aim for the stars. Of course there’s nothing wrong with that, but having too complex a storyline, or too complex a setting may ruin a movie. The second film by Mr. Bade that I watched, which was Gangster, fell into this trap. Again, Rosyam Nor was the lead, and in a move which comes off as gimmicky at best, he plays a number of different characters. The problem is, while he may be a competent actor, his acting acumen was not diverse enough for him to take upon multiple roles. And coupled with some poor editing work, which is essential in movies with multiple storylines such as this, I came away disappointed with Gangster.
What about Castello then? Well, it may be Mr. Bade’s most ambitious effort yet, but it turned out to be his weakest so far. Rosyam Nor plays the character Castello, a reformed criminal from Southern Thailand who is then released after serving more than a decade in prison. He returns to his wife and teenage child who had moved to Kuala Lumpur, only to discover that while he is trying so hard to stay away out of trouble, it would seem that trouble somehow finds him, in large part due to the actions of his estranged daughter. He ends up hunting (and being hunted) by a group of small time drug dealers.
The movie just doesn’t work. The acting is wooden, especially the choice to cast Erra Fazira as a Castello’s wife is a poor one. I just did not buy her role as a the ‘long suffering wife’. The storyline was pretty weak too, with the characters making illogical choices throughout the movie.
But Castello is an action movie, first and foremost. So how did the action scenes fare? Well some of the hand to hand fighting are quite good, and the movie did not shy away from showing blood when people get shot (although the blood looks really fake). The main attraction for the movie was a jet ski chase along the Klang River, and while the scene itself is impressive for a Malaysian movie, it just did not fit in with the flow of the movie. The events leading up to the chase was so illogical and unbelievable that the scene failed totally for me. It seemed as if the makers of the movie wanted to fit the scene in at any costs. Like they thought about that particular scene first before constructing a storyline and a movie around it. Which unfortunately did not work in Castello.
April 21st, 2006 at 4:21 pm
You watched Costello without me, that’s why you didnt enjoy it :p