Indonesian Film: Anda Puas Saya Loyo

There's a reason why i've been avoiding Indonesian films like a plague. Despite the popular beliefs, i personally think that Indonesian Films, albeit increasing considerably in terms of quantity, decreased alarmingly rapid in terms of quality. Not a long time ago, when horror films become the staple of popular culture, not a month went by without at least two more-or-less the same horror films. We've seen three "Pocong" films, three (or is it four?) "Kuntilanak" films in a matter of months, and you could pretty much ask for any kind of demon spawned from the local myth and folklore (or simply ripped-off from other Asian horror films) for a film. Believe it or not despite the similar formula, almost predictable writing, and bad bad bad production quality, it works and most importantly to them producers, it making money. Henceforth, as long as these film keeps making money, we keep see them coming. One after another, plaguing local theaters.

Now, the trend had shifted. But it shows the significant decline to an already declining stale state of the previous trend (teenage horror films). I believe it begins with "Quickie Express". A film which humors was intended to adult viewers (therefore, mainly involving the crotch area related jokes). We've seen this kind of films back then in 70s when Dono Kasino Indro ruled the cinema. If you remembered them, certainly you'd remembered its repetitive 'plot'. Three men, and two voluptuous women shared a house, while the third woman arrive in the scene, and at one point in the film, all six went to the beach where "adult-jokes" littered the space. Rinse and repeat for the next film. And believe it or not, they were rated PG-13. Now if i had a ten-year old boy, i won't let him watch any of their film.

Sadly, after the "phenomenal" success of "Quickie Express" (i'm just making things up, i have no idea on how phenomenal nor was the film even qualifiable to had the term "success" attached to it), we've seen another trend. That's right, as you can see in this promotional poster of a yet another proof of the declining state of Indonesian film, the horror films trend has been replaced with "17+ comedy films". We're scarcely seen any teenage-horror films nowadays. Instead we have titles such as, "XL - eXtra Large" which made it's easy to guess which part of the human body has an "eXtra Large" attribute, "Namaku Dick" (My name is Dick) which doesn't need further explaining, "ML (Mau Lagi)" which has a bit of trouble with the censorship and currently postponed its screening. For a damn good reasons, if i may add. And as you may already know, ML is also an abbreviated form of "Make Love" a widely accepted popular term to denote a coitus activities. You can't get more explicit than that. I believe that there's more examples of "17+ comedy films" released in the past couple of months alone but i had no knowledge whatsoever about them, forgotten about them and simply don't care.

And finally this, which a quick glance to the promotional poster says all. Save Indonesian films industry. Don't see any of these cash-cow films. Heck, never thought i'd say this, watch "Ayat-Ayat Cinta" again (for the record, i've never seen the film, ever, and not interested to see it in the near future). Save Indonesian films.