Genre: Action
Running Length: 1:40
Cast: Hairul Azreen, Ammar Alfian, Henley Hii, Taufik Hanafi, Gambit Saifullah, Hafizul Kamal, Theebaan G. Jasmine Suraya, Amerul Affendi, Nam Ron
Director: Adrian Teh
Screenplay: Anwari Ashraf
What's this movie about?
PASKAL (Pasukan Khas Laut) is the Navy Seals of Malaysia, the elite unit in the Royal Malaysian Navy. The movie's narrative is a mix of dramatized re-enactment of actual past missions, their training regime and some very engaging action pieces. Plus, it's also peppered with some family drama.
In all honesty, even though the trailer looked promising, I went into the cinema with the "Malaysian movies can or not wan?" cynicism.
But boboiboy boy oh boy, was I blown away!
Highlights!
I'm so very glad the filmmakers didn't CGI the heck out of this movie.
And I'm so very glad that most of the film was shot on location with real ships, planes, helicopters, submarine (!) and weaponry.
From a technical standpoint, this movie is an achievement. The sound is good (the sound of the bullets hitting metal objects sounded real), the gun fires are real, no CGI explosion fakery - everything just looks organic, dangerous and realistic.
There are some tense moments especially from the last mission which got me at the edge of my seat.
The violence wasn't glorified but necessary.
I was half expecting the training scenes to be filled with "Sir, yes sir!" tropes but wow, it was different! Yeah, there's the standard Major Payne character yelling at the team but I guess it didn't feel cliche because the group's dynamic led by their de facto leader (Hairul) came across as believable. In fact, some of the lighter moments came from this part of the movie.
And there was this NICE shot of them trying to tahan (hold their breath) underwater.
Lowlights
I felt the main pirate baddie played by Amerul was too OTT. He's one of those froth at the mouth, ha-ha-ha, teeth gnashing type of villain. He just came across as a tad too cartoonish.
And there's the missed opportunity of one of the characters. If the film's writer would have given him more layers, he could have come across as interesting as Erik Killmonger in Black Panther.
In summary
What I really appreciate are the little little touches the filmmakers added to make PASKAL a Malaysian movie, for example where the team berdoa (prayed) before they embarked on a mission.
Judging by the box office success it is currently enjoying, it's a timely release where the rakyat (citizens) is feeling all time patriotically high now. To be fair, it's doing good commercially not because the filmmakers were opportunistic but this movie is actually good.
It's probably one of the most realistic badass local action movie I've seen in a while.
Makes me wanna sign up to join TLDM now!
RATING: 8/10
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