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Alice and her
mother, Tara, move into a new apartment
and it doesn't take long before Alice starts to
realize that something's not right there. Tara refuses
to believe that the haunting visions Alice is having
are ghosts and think that it's all Alice's imagination.
The only person Alice can seek comfort from now is her
classmate Ramon. But solving this mystery might be a
bad idea, a very bad idea.
Indonesian horror flicks are a dime a dozen these days
and Lewat Tengah Malam is no exception. Just like with
so many Indo horror movies, Lewat Tengah Malam (which
translates to After Midnight) tries desperately to
scare the audience over and over again with cheap
tricks and ridiculously loud noises (seriously, these
noises could make anyone go def) but fails to create
a real sense of terror. The ghosts appear way too
frequently and after a while it becomes too obvious
when, where and how they're going to show up next.
The story isn't exactly original either. A single
mother and her teenage daughter move into a haunted
apartment. How many times haven't we seen that before?
Director Koya Pagayo tries in vain to create an
original spin on the concept though as it soon turns
out that the ghost haunting Alice is in fact herself.
But again, haven't we seen that before? By the time
we're given the ludicrous twist-like explanation,
I had grown so sick of the movie that I was reading
the back of the cover for the fifth time even though
I didn't understand a word of what it said.
To be fair, Lewat Tengah Malam does have a few, and
I mean FEW redeeming qualities. For example, the
opening scene where the credits roll is pure genius.
I also loved the way the title was shown after the
opening credits were done. Yeah, I was actually
really pumped heading into this movie as the first
five minutes showed a lot of promise. After that I had
a hard time finding more redeeming qualities however.
The movie does look technically decent with nice
cinematography and good night scenes where you can
actually see what's going on for once. The acting is
also surprisingly good for an Indonesian movie,
perhaps due to the fact that they hired a professional
cast for once rather than picking up random people
from the street like they usually do (it's a budget thing).
Lewat Tengah Malam sure as hell won't scare anyone and
it's not very entertaining either, but compared to
other recent Indo horror flicks, it has a few qualities
that others have lacked and therefore I can't give it
a lower rating than 2/5. It's dreadfully dull but at
least it's fairly nice to look at. I'm glad to see that
the Indo movie industry is evolving, even though they're
still stuck at generic ghost stories. Hopefully we'll
get a more original horror movie in the near future.
If not? Well then, let's pray for Pocong 3.
Nothing here.
Decent score but the sound effects were way too noisy.
Dull and generic ghost story that fails to create any
kind of atmosphere and doesn't manage to scare you
even once due to the fact that the ghosts appear way
too frequently. It has a few redeeming qualities but
not enough for you to try to track this one down. No
wonder Indo movies rarely find distribution outside
its native country. Bah.
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