Member D1 Ma Posted April 8, 2012 Member Share Posted April 8, 2012 Went to see the movie just to support Gareth Evans’ creation. And it was a right choice. This movie is all about Gareth. Although Iko and the others did a really great job, but you can replace them with any decent martial artists and still have an outstanding action movie. I wouldn’t go as far as saying it was better than The Killer or Hard Boiled, but I’m pretty sure that Gareth Evans is the director, who could shoot a good remake of either of those two. As for The Raid, the first half was just brilliant, but it kinda wound down at the last third of the movie. As much as I love MA I thought that the last fight while still good and could’ve been a high point of any other movie, was a bit of a letdown and the knife fights and the shootouts were much more exciting. (Probably the closest mix of gunplay, MA and sword fights I saw at the end of Dragon Family). Action choreo was superb all around and was shot and cut simply flawlessly. Usually, I like to look for things to complaint about, but not in this case. Can’t praise it enough. Plus I though that all that violence was totally appropriate and just stressed out the raw desperation of a caged animal that wants to survive at any cost..Also, the movie didn’t look like a demo reel, it was a simple but very solid movie as a whole. (I agree with those who said that sometimes it felt like a zombie flick ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member daisho2004 Posted April 8, 2012 Member Share Posted April 8, 2012 @D1 Ma: See everyone misunderstands what I'm saying as it is better than Hard Boiled & The Killer To me every Action I see I compare to those movies which are classics hands down! And when you figure how long ago those were made also. Hard Boiled was made in 1992' & The Killer in 1989' See right now to me The Raid is at the number #1 spot! Just like everyone is saying Ip Man is one of the greatest MA movies of all times, its just my own opinion. I would love to see John Woo make another movie with Chow Yun Fat, I think its been long over do! But lets be honeslty what really is the best action movie that has been made in the last few years that is non stop action like this? I mean The Man from Nowhere is Great, & I Saw the Devil but nothing like The Raid! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member D1 Ma Posted April 8, 2012 Member Share Posted April 8, 2012 No doubt, The Raid IS one of the best MA/action movies of the last 10 years. (Personally, I would put it right after Ong Bak). I can see The Raid being put -maybe- on the same level as those two classics, but not better. (I'm just nit-picking a little ) (it doesn't cease to amaze me that at this day and age one can still make a great action movie for around $1 mil! You just have to have talent) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Yi-Long Posted April 9, 2012 Share Posted April 9, 2012 (it doesn't cease to amaze me that at this day and age one can still make a great action movie for around $1 mil! You just have to have talent) That doesn't surprise me at all TBH. When you have very little funds, you have to be very creative with the tools you have, which is talented martial artists doing what they do best. The more money you have in your budget, the more you're inclined to just blow it up on big fireworks and carchases or whatever, while in reality there is very little as thrilling as just pure and simple great hand-to-hand combat between great screen-fighters. Also, physical action has emotional impact. You can spend a few million dollars on blowing up a 100 storey building from 8 different angles and in slow-mo, but you can film a good punch to someone's face for free, and it probably has a bigger impact on the audience when done right. Nobody really has a connection with 'a building', but fighting is somehow something that connects to us on a personal level. So no, I'm not amazed at all that you can have great action coming from a limited budget. Quite the contrary. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member OpiumKungFuCracker Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 No doubt, The Raid IS one of the best MA/action movies of the last 10 years. (Personally, I would put it right after Ong Bak). I can see The Raid being put -maybe- on the same level as those two classics, but not better. (I'm just nit-picking a little ) (it doesn't cease to amaze me that at this day and age one can still make a great action movie for around $1 mil! You just have to have talent) You think Ong bak is better than the raid???? You take away Tony Jaa's fights in those movie and what do you have??? In the Raid if you take away the Silat fighting in that movie, you would still end up with a pretty good decent action flick... The Raid had like 3 different genres rolled into one... The Raid is the best action movie of 2012 for sure.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member daisho2004 Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 @Yi-Long: I agree with you I would much rather have more hand to hand combat then blowing up buildings any day! I guess that's why we all love the classic SB movies from back in the day! Its was all about training to beat the bad guys! @D1 Ma: I think The Raid surpasses Ong Bak on every level, and I loved Ong Bak! I think OB#2 was better than the 1st. movie it was a throw back to an old school genre. Even though they had absolutely nothing to do with each other. Still great movies but like Yi-Long said it just goes to show you you can still make a great MA movie without a huge budget behind you. Its just a real Damn shame that The Raid is only been getting limited releases. Hollywood hasn't even come close to anything this Great in a long time! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member trueth Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 @Yi-Long: I agree with you I would much rather have more hand to hand combat then blowing up buildings any day! I guess that's why we all love the classic SB movies from back in the day! Its was all about training to beat the bad guys! @D1 Ma: I think The Raid surpasses Ong Bak on every level, and I loved Ong Bak! I think OB#2 was better than the 1st. movie it was a throw back to an old school genre. Even though they had absolutely nothing to do with each other. Still great movies but like Yi-Long said it just goes to show you you can still make a great MA movie without a huge budget behind you. Its just a real Damn shame that The Raid is only been getting limited releases. Hollywood hasn't even come close to anything this Great in a long time! Yeah it's pretty ridiculous. My usual theater doesnt pick up limited release films, they have 10 screens and 2 of them are showing Titanic 3d. I have to drive 2 hours just to see this film. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member ghevans Posted April 9, 2012 Author Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 Huge thanks everyone for your comments on the film, apologies for not being on here much lately but things have been a tad hectic doing promos for the film in different territories. Cannot express how thankful I am to all of you that have gone out to support the film in the cinema, it's so important to us making these films in this genre at this budget level to be able to prove their worth on an industry level so honestly every ticket sold counts so much. It also goes some way in helping me justify what I want to do with the sequel so thank you! Sony's release is due to go wider again this weekend, should be a significant increase in venues and screens across the US. For anyone in UK we have a few festival / special advanced screenings, but we will have a pretty wide release also come May 18th. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member daisho2004 Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 @ghevans: Loved the Film! One of the Best Action I ever seen! Can you confirm is this going to be a trilogy or is a sequel or prequel in the works! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member ghevans Posted April 9, 2012 Author Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 Plans are for a trilogy, I have a full story in place for part 2. General concept for part 3 but nothing solid yet. I wouldn't make part 3 for some time though. Once part 2 is done I want to explore something else with Silat before revisiting The Raid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member D1 Ma Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 @ Yi-Long When I was saying how surprised I was that the quality movie(to say the least) was made at this budget, I was thinking about Hong Kong movie industry first of all. They used to create action relatively cheap, but now I don't think they can produce even a thriller for less than a couple of mil. It's always being said how it's difficult for HK movies to compete, that they don't have big budgets, it's hard to make a profit because expenses are so high, but as The Raid shows it still can be done. As for the Ong Bak vs. The Raid argument, I stick to my opinion. These are two different movies, each outstanding in it's own way and I feel it's kind of silly to even compare the two, but I just wanted to say this: I LOVED The Raid, but I think Ong Bak created a much bigger bang worldwide when it came out. It made a star out of Tony Jaa, made Panna known in the West, showed the world what Muai Thai is, displayed really amazing moves and stunts and created the wave of Thailand's Muai Thai and stunts flicks, making Thailand THE place for hard hitting action movies for the moment. The Raid is a SUPERB action movie, but mostly it demonstrates great abilities of Gareth Evans to shoot and edit action sequences. (No disrespect to the rest of the team ( both in front and behind the camera), but I think it's Gareth who deserves most of the credit) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Markgway Posted April 9, 2012 Share Posted April 9, 2012 My "local" doesn't have listings up yet for May 18th so I'll have to wait and see if it's on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member OpiumKungFuCracker Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 Count me in as one of the few that liked Ong Bak 2 more than the 1st.. @ghevans would you consider doing other types of genre like crime/comedy, something like guy ritchie's Snatch?? I could easily see you do something like that probably even better than Guy Ritchie, after Snatch I didn't like much of what he did even the Sherlock Holmes stuff... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Pai Mei Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 The only movie worth seeing had a weekend gross of around $560k, bringing its total gross to about $1.3M. It’s apparently playing in 176 theaters, but next week that number will jump again to something like 707 theaters. Roughly estimating, this should gross another $2M next weekend. I’ve done my good deed for the week and have hyped this up so much that a few of my friends are letting me drag them two hours (four hours round trip) to the nearest theater showing The Raid next weekend. Man the suspense is killing me, I’ve been counting down the days to see this for about a month now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator One Armed Boxer Posted April 9, 2012 Moderator Share Posted April 9, 2012 I just got through watching this at the local cinema here in Sydney, and have to echo everyone else's sentiments that this is pretty much as good of an action movie as you're going to get, not just now but in the history of action cinema, I believe 'The Raid' will definitely withstand the test of time twenty years from now, just like 'Hard Boiled' does. There are few movies that manage to mix gunplay and martial arts successfully, the only other one I can think of off the top of my head being 'Eastern Condors', but 'The Raid' blends the two perfectly, topped off with some truly vicious knife fighting. For the people who thought the knife fight at the end of 'Man From Nowhere' was outstanding, this has about 10 times the amount of knife action within it's run-time, and none of them are even the final fight! A couple of people mentioned that the movie had a zombie feel in regards to the bad guys, I can understand that point of view, but for me the movie to a much higher degree echoed John Carpenter's original 'Assault on Precinct 13'. 'The Raid' has a very similar plot structure in terms of a few characters being holed up in a building against the odds, and the Mike Shinoda soundtrack (which by the way, suits the movie perfectly, regardless of it's not the original soundtrack or not) is also reminiscent of Carpenter's own synthezied soundtracks to his earlier movies. 'The Raid' is of course on a much bigger scale that 'Assault on Precinct 13', and is all the better for it. The fight scenes are outstanding....that scene in the corridor, wow. The deseperation and brutality of it were simply amazing. & hats off to Gareth Evans for the superb camerawork, is he possibly the first director since Sammo Hung's best works to actually make the way the camera moves add to the impact of a fight? Everything about the way the camera moves compliments the movement of the action perfectly, not only complimenting it but adding to it, this movie shows what action direction should be like. Yes it's very common for people to say simply put the camera in one position and let it capture the action as it is....but 'The Raid' actually serves as a reminder that, if done right, the camera can be just as much a part of the action process as the performers themselves. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member daisho2004 Posted April 9, 2012 Member Share Posted April 9, 2012 OK Great looking forward to your next project. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Tosh Posted April 10, 2012 Member Share Posted April 10, 2012 Just watched this today, on my way to the theater I was afraid the hype and my own expectations was going to let me down, all I have to say is I had nothing to worry about. The movie kicks in and doesn't stop, to the blow the shit out of everything gunfight to the crazy weapon work down to hand and hand combat, it all delivers. Where most movies fail is in the villains, all I got to say is maddog is today's Silver Fox, one of the baddest MF'er ever to hit the screen. I don't get the zombie talk? I think they did a great job of showing a bunch of street thugs, has hollywood's inept portrayal of the bad guys jade an entire generation or something? Also the 3rd act was just as good, the end fight is as brutal as it gets, and I have no complaints! This is kung fu crack for us that grew up on Venom movies, and that's no disrespect for Silat, a very interesting martial art, and I can't wait to see more of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Tosh Posted April 10, 2012 Member Share Posted April 10, 2012 Went to see the movie just to support Gareth Evans’ creation. And it was a right choice. This movie is all about Gareth. Although Iko and the others did a really great job, but you can replace them with any decent martial artists and still have an outstanding action movie I couldn't disagree more, the cast was topnotch, even the secondary guys all kicked major ass, in a world of action movies with more and more pop stars, we got the real deal this time. As for comparing it to Ong Bak, I can definitely see the Thai/Jaa influence, the fights are hard hitting and brutal like OB1/2 and TYG, I just hope the Thais see how a badass villain and smoother editing can make a movie that much better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Chinatown Kid Posted April 10, 2012 Member Share Posted April 10, 2012 Gotta go see this just because it's been so long since I saw a martial arts movie on the big screen, great to know it kicks ass! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member The Last Dragon Posted April 10, 2012 Member Share Posted April 10, 2012 The only movie worth seeing had a weekend gross of around $560k, bringing its total gross to about $1.3M. It’s apparently playing in 176 theaters, but next week that number will jump again to something like 707 theaters. Roughly estimating, this should gross another $2M next weekend. I’ve done my good deed for the week and have hyped this up so much that a few of my friends are letting me drag them two hours (four hours round trip) to the nearest theater showing The Raid next weekend. Man the suspense is killing me, I’ve been counting down the days to see this for about a month now. Pai Mei trust me, trust everybody, even your friends will thank you later. It will be worth the wait. So glad Gareth has a trilogy in the works. Definitely as somebody mentioned earlier I know Iko definitely is a star Gareth really is the talent for this movie with the way he executed everything. Anybody that is an action fan even a casual one needs to see this movie. You really felt for the characters especially in the beginning in the movie cause it swas like wow this is going to turn out bad for some folks. They really build up the suspense for a little bit. Gareth is keeping the momentum going unlike in Thailand unfortunately with Tony Jaa. It's really like after Ong Bak I things he got so much attention and time commitment for everything something must have been wrong. Hearing of him leaving the set and retreating to a temple for awhile. I guess IN between that there was Ong Bak 2 and The Protector (English version I saw I apologize) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member daisho2004 Posted April 10, 2012 Member Share Posted April 10, 2012 @OAB: The Knife fights were Off the Hook! Blew away any Knife fight that I ever seen before! I'm still pissed that this movie is only being shown in limited release! I cannot wait for it on BR-DVD! I was watching The Killer last night with Chow Yun Fat still a classic. I think with G.Evans & Iko its like John Woo & Chow Yun Fat a great combo that can only get better in time. I mean its going to be hard to top The Raid even in a sequel I cannot even imagine how he can out do himself on his next project. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member ghevans Posted April 11, 2012 Author Member Share Posted April 11, 2012 Sorry I couldn't give specifics before but Twitch just posted an article that outlines Sony's push to give this as wide a release as they possibly can for this film. 875 screens total!!! I'm really excited to see how the film performs this weekend I really hope that it plays near some of you and that you guys will go out and support the film. I'm deeply touched reading some of the feedback on this thread, to see you guys analyze what we've aimed to achieve with the film and see that you guys didnt come away disappointed - it's beyond humbling. Thanks again! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member rdenn Posted April 11, 2012 Member Share Posted April 11, 2012 looks like this is already showing in london http://www.cineplex.com/Theatres/TheatreDetails/SilverCity-London-Cinemas.aspx Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Markgway Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Apparently there was an evening festival screening at my local rep on Sunday. I had no idea... lol. Hopefully they'll show it again come general release. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrator KUNG FU BOB Posted April 11, 2012 Administrator Share Posted April 11, 2012 My son and I are going to see this tomorrow, as soon as I pick him up from school. We are so freaking excited! If the timing works out, we'll go straight from this to Philly to see the uncut print of SCHOOL ON FIRE that they're showing. How's that for a double feature? I will, of course, be posting tomorrow night about the film (or films). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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