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Nino, a
computer nerd is obsessed with his brother
Aldo's flirtatious girlfriend, Virni. To achieve his
goal, in desperation, Nino decides to play dirty by
using black magic. He steals a pocong cord of a dead
girl to make a love potion. When the potion doesn't
work it angers him so badly that he burns it. Of
course it leads to continuous terror by the pocong
that finally kills him. However, even if Nino's dead,
the pocong keeps haunting Virni and Aldo. Is there
more mystery behind the pocong cord of a virgin?
"The movie that will haunt you in 2008" that's the
tagline of this movie that has been intensively
promoted even since early this year. With its silly
teaser trailer shown in almost in every theatre during
trailer time, surely the producer really meant
business in trying hard to convince the audience.
Indeed, based on my observation, the producer should
gain delicious revenue from this movie, as the seats
are mostly full. But does it actually deserve praise?
The story is actually based on traditional occultism
practice, possibly still exist until today in certain
places in Indonesia. Pocong is a traditional way to
bury people, where they are wrapped in white cloth
(like a mummy) - this ghost has been used several times
before in Indonesian horror movies. The pocong cord of
a person who has just died is said to have magical
powers, as long as it doesn't pass 40th day of his
death. It is used as some kind of requirement to
master a certain black magic. That's why until today
in areas where people still believe this mythical
tradition, if someone dies the grave will be guarded
during 40 days to prevent the body snatchers.
Had the movie maker chose to deliver the story with
this traditional background complete with thorough
research, this could've been an interesting movie.
Unfortunately just like most mainstream silly Indonesia
horror movie makers, they chose to simply transform
the setting into urban environment and using common
"shock to scare" approach with same old silly overloud
bang plus a little bit imitating the excellent
Rudi Soedjawo's Pocong series (as well as ripping off
scenes from The Eye completely). But don't expect this
to be as excellent - it's not.
Full of meaningless dialogue, silly script as usual,
weak plot, weak character, mediocre to bad acting,
those are usual stuff that you see in this movie.
I even suspect that now the maker determines the
scary scenes first, the story later. Let's take a
look at these two examples:
First, in the story, the Nino character wants to
get a pocong cord as the main ingredient for a love
potion. So he should get a "fresh" dead virgin.
Instead of going directly to the grave he goes to the
morgue, sneaking into the hospital hiding under
sheets pretending to be a corpse. Why this scene is
made? Well, most likely to create a scene where
"shock sequences" can be shown, where he pulls these
trays of dead bodies, one loud bang for each tray.
Expected to shock and deafen audience. Fuck the plot
or logic. Oh well.
Next one, of course Nino failed in the morgue, so he
decides to go to the grave instead after reading a
suicide scene of a virgin. He should've done this in
the very first place but he doesn't because that
would make the scene at the morgue non-existent.
Hahahaha, but not that funny. In the cemetery, the
grave of this dead virgin is actually guarded by two
goofy characters, who overslept. But there's no way
these grave keepers can sleep so soundly that they
can't hear Nino digging the grave which is actually
next to the spot where they sleep! But the movie
maker decides to offend our intelligence by ignoring
this fact! Oh well.
So what is it about this movie that attracted so many
viewers? I believe it's skin. Yes, today Indonesian
movies get more and more "liberal" in exposing sexy
girls, though not yet naked. But the female performers
in this film are indeed very sexy and drives up male
hormones. The females mostly dress only in tank tops,
mini skirts, very short shorts, bikinis, and there's
a sexy bathtub scene which later spoiled by pocong in
a bathtub. Plenty of kissing, holding, petting, though
still no explicit love making scenes but those "hot"
expositions certainly are "braver" than most
Indonesian movies. Though bad, apparently the audience
rather enjoyed being shocked by pocong throughout
the movie. But indeed, imagining pocong appearing here,
there, and everywhere can make us quite paranoid.
The performers are as usual, newcomers, except Ramon
Y. Tungka as Nino (but Ramon is not a veteran either,
but certainly he can perform much better in other
movies). Dewi Persik is a sexy and controversial
Indonesian singer who is more famous with her gossip
instead of her album. Ibnu Jamil seems to be a model,
but who cares, their acting sucks anyway. But I love
the supporting actress playing as Virni's friend.
She's tall, gorgeous, and hot... so this might also be
the contributing factor of why the movie has become so
ridiculously popular.
Arie Azis, the director, is also the maker of silly
but very successful "Suster Ngesot the Movie" and
"Lawang Sewu: Dendam Kuntilanak". Still relying on old
formula but always draw plenty of audience, I think
she (or he?) won't be encouraged to create more
creative horrors in the future.
None.
Usual crappy loud bangs. No worthy soundtrack.
Shocks and skin, that's what constitutes this movie.
Forget about anything called story, acting, script,
etc. It's so unbelievable that this actually draws
plenty of audience. But for me, if concerning pocong,
Rudi Soedjarwo is still the ultimate pocong handler.
Watch for your own curiosity, but don't say I didn't
warn you. Tali Pocong Perawan: the movie that will
haunt you... with stupidity.
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