Timo Tjahjanto, whose recent Netflix hit, The Night Comes For Us, proved to be a bloody, flesh-severing martial arts action affair of the highest order upon releasing back in October. The goal, of course and as always with the streaming service, is to get people to watch, and of course, Tjahjanto has certainly lended his voice to the cause.
Orson Welles said of friendship that, through it, we get to create the illusion that we are not alone. He said of women that through them men become civilized. I wonder what he would have thought of The Night Comes For Us, a film that illustrates friendship (both its value and fragility) through a harsh, deconstructive lens, and presents a young girl as the catalyst for its protagonist’s quest to civilize himself, that is, to regain his civility after a career of criminality and murder.
In all certainty, Timo Tjahjanto’s sprawling, bloody, rip-roaring opus of violence, penance and redemption in The Night Comes For Us is meant to be more than just a one-off for action fans. Point in fact, Tjahjanto himself hinted on Twitter about his own hopes to act on the momentum created by the film to build a cinematic world in which there is more to the story than the one led by Joe Taslim in the role of gangland enforcer-turned-bodyguard and avenging angel of death, Ito.
You can pretty much look up any review online as of late and so I don’t really think my opinion about this film is necessary at this point. However, if there some who still care for it, I’ll say this much: The Night Comes For Us is as hyperviolent, fight-heavy and gruesome and as you would expect – maybe even to the point of overkill what with the abrupt stop/start pivot the film took amid the long seven-year wait in its languishing evolution.
If you’re like me, the past four years have probably proven to be one of the biggest waiting games you’ve ever played. It’s certainly been longer for acclaimed Mo’ Bro filmmaker, director Timo Tjahjanto since arduously birthing his concepts for The Night Comes For Us with the goal of bringing back The Raid actor Joe Taslim.
Right about now, every MA cinema fan’s favorite five words of late have been manifest into striking new action footage for Macabre and Headshot co-helmer Timo Tjahjanto’s new thriller, The Night Comes For Us. The official website for next month’s 51st Sitges Film Festival is currently host to said footage featuring the ceremonial return of actor Joe Taslim to the screen.
It certainly doesn’t feel like it’s been seven or eight years since news arose of upcoming neo-noir gangster thriller, The Night Comes For Us. Looking back though, it certainly hits you like a ton of bricks remembering that this film was supposed to take off back in 2014 at the very least.
Speaking of Apostle, the thirteenth annual Fantastic Fest is now readying things for its September 20 launch. The Gareth Huw Evans-directed 70′ cult horror/noir homage is now line-up in the festival’s First Wave next to the likes of the hotly-anticipated The Night Comes For Us, J.J. Abrams’ thrilling new WWII sci-fi/horror, Overlord and Ueda Shinichiro’s summer fest beloved One Cut For The Dead among others.
We’re continuing the Five-A-Day column today listing, and in no certain order, various action film titles fans may be keen on going into the new year. Here’s yesterday’s batch for starters and below are today’s:
Legendary actress and martial artist Michelle Yeoh is reportedly the In Focus subject for the forthcoming International Film Festival & Awards Macao which takes place between December 8 through 14. It makes an even worthier note of the Star Trek: Discovery series co-star’s forthcoming appearance Yuen Woo Ping’s pending Ip Man spin-off, Master Z: Ip Man Legacy in which actor Max Zhang reprises Cheung Tin-Chi, the role he played opposite action star Donnie Yen in the 2016 kung fu hit, Ip Man 3. Details on all ends are pending for the film which also has Dave Bautista and Tony Jaa in its line-up.
Jimmy Henderson’s third directorial offering, Jailbreak was a festival favorite among cinephiles and genre loyalists alike. Rising stars Jean-Paul Ly, Dara Our and Thatothoum Sam lead the cast opposite Celine Tran for the story of a tactical unit trapped inside an unsecure prison and forced to fight to keep a criminal witness alive. XYZ Films is releasing this one through Vertical Entertainment and presumably in 2018 as well as a date is still pending.
Also on deck from Vertical is Shimomura Yuji’s ghoulish new commando action thriller, Re:Born, which has seen actor Sakaguchi Tak’s return to film be quite the ceremonies revival it deserves. The film’s show of WAVE combat techniques serve as part of the backdrop for the tale of a reclusive ex-soldier forced back into battle to protect a young girl in his care from an old friend-turned-enemy in the wake hunting down his former team. Considering the nature of limited theater releases like this, I would hate to see this film released in a theater that won’t allow later showtimes. Here’s a trailer for its U.K. release:
Following up on his previous pairings with film cohort Kimo Stamboel, fellow ‘Mo Bro Timo Tjahjanto goes solo for the hotly anticipated return of actor and martial artist Joe Taslim with gangland thriller, The Night Comes For Us. The film was stifled for a few years due to unforeseen circumstances before production finally took off late last year and with a 2018 date, will soon tell the tale of an enforcer who returns to Jakarta where his crime family awaits the boiling point of a brewing mob war between bitter rivals. The film is already in post-production with Timo teasing the goods little by little on his Instagram page:
Here’s a first teaser of @joe_taslim as Ito the Triad’s enforcer in #TNCFU. Yes he’ll bleed alot & yes it will be Joe like you’ll never see him before. Stay tuned for more characters revealed.
A post shared by Timo Tjahjanto (@timobros) on Sep 4, 2017 at 7:49pm PDT
There hasn’t been much put out in public view but progress is still being made as director R.L. Scott continues to put the finishing touches on his latest superhero pivot, Lazarus. Scott reunites with Call Me King co-star Sean Riggs who leads the gritty and dark vigilante action horror tale telling of a super powered crimefighter’s one-man war on an organization to free the city from darkness. I honestly wish I could tell you more about this project, and seeing as how I can’t at current, next year should be a lot more promising as the film nears all the ins and outs of completion and acquisition.
We’ll pick up on five more tomorrow. In the meantime, post your picks in the comment section below for what lies ahead on your 2018 moviegoing calendar!
Keeping certain of our attention through 2018 with the usual slow pacing of jewels for Timo Tjahjanto’s The Night Comes For Us, we have another still from the post production phase as its end inches closer. The film is Tjahjanto’s solo feature debut with actor and martial artist Joe Taslim since breaking out in supporting fashion with Gareth Evans’s The Raid (2011) and in Justin Lin’s Star Trek: Beyond (2016) for his first Hollywood endeavor.
Lest you forget about writer and director Timo Tjahjanto’s solo directorial debut, The Night Comes For Us, more updates are still to come. Production on the film wrapped back in March on the pic with a near-seven year evolution in its wake before starting in December 2016.
Princpal photography wrapped on Tuesday for the filming leg of writer and director Timo Tjahjanto’s solo directorial debut, The Night Comes For Us. Production on the pic took a near-seven year evolution and finally went underway last December with scenes filmed in and around Jakarta, Indonesia for its seventy-six day shoot following its resurrection last August.
The film sees the return of actor Joe Taslim (Furious 6, Star Trek: Beyond) for his debut lead role as Ito, a gangland enforcer arriving from his stint at abroad and home to his crime family in Jakarta only to find himself caught in a web of turmoil, treachery and violent upheaval. Reuniting with Taslim is action star Iko Uwais following their appearance together in Gareth Evans’s The Raid (2011), while casting familars from Tjahjanto’s resume include the additions of Julie Estelle, Epy Kusandar, Sunny Pang, Zack Lee, Hannah Al Rashid and Shareefa Daanish with Abimanya Aryasatya and actress Salvita Decorte also starring.
Kimo Stamboel is also producing with XYZ Films’s Nick Spicer with Todd Brown serving as executive producer, and action sequences coordinated by Uwais along with Very Tri Yulisman. As far as the usual processes go, expect this one to start trickling out later this year and on through 2018 with exact premiere dates and releases pending.
Uwais, Estelle and Pang can currently be seen in the latest Mo Bros’ action-packed thriller, Headshot, now available on VoD from XYZ Films and Vertical Entertainment.
Stay tuned for further explicit details on The Night Comes For Us as it enters post-production!
Thats a wrap guys! On to the next phase.✂️?. #thatsawrap
A post shared by KiMoztagram (@kimostamboel) on Mar 21, 2017 at 5:19am PDT
Nearly two years have passed since news slowly and quietly broke of the shelving of the Joe Taslim-starring action vehicle, The Night Comes For Us, and the real reasons why remain unbeknownst to the public. The film was drawn on the hinges of the recent successes of Indonesian film hits like Gareth Evans’s Merantau, The Raid and The Raid 2, in addition to directing duo Timo Tjahjanto and Kimo Stamboel’s Macabre and Killers, and as one of two genre films being planned by Merantau and XYZ Films.
Indonesia’s current film climate is a lagging a bit nowadays, and there have been casualties as a result-namely whatever the heck stonewalled production for Timo Tjahjanto’s The Night Comes For Us back in September. Thankfully some projects haven’t faltered, including Anggy Umbara‘s upcoming heist sequel, Comic 8: Casino Kings.
The film is arriving in 2015 with a larger cast and even greater scope to accomodate its larger budget following the success of its first installment in early 2014. Several cast and set pictures have appeared online, and if you’ve been enthusiastically following the career of fellow Indonesian action star Yayan Ruhian can expect to see him in the upcoming heist action adventure as well, that is if this picture has anything to say for it.
Ruhian contributed to the pre-production phase of The Night Comes For Us with action star Iko Uwais solely choreographing the fights, and Merantau and The Raid franchise auteur Gareth Huw Evans directing the action. Those efforts eventually got canned while Ruhian has clearly moved on Comic 8: Casino Kings, and training actor Frank Grillo earlier on with Iko Uwais for upcoming sci-fi sequel, Beyond Skyline.
Hopefully some more cohesive news will come our way soon, but in the meantime, it should be cool to see Ruhian on set with a number of seasoned Indonesian action favorites, even if he is ectoplasmic among them, figuratively speaking that is. Besides, One Good Thing and Yakuza Apocalypse should be on the way as well last I checked, and if it is at all in the cards, a hopeful reprisal as a new character in The Raid 3. These all remain to be seen, of course, but they are reasonable hopes to hold onto at least.
UPDATE (12/24/14): Based on a Tweet response four days ago, it appears that Tjahjanto is taking his vision for the former production of The Night Comes For Us and putting it into graphic novel form with Glitch Network. Production on the film itself suddenly halted back in September for reasons unknown. (Special thanks to commentor, Fatso, for the heads’ up!)
Photo from ClickOnline by Jack McGlynn (2013)
Lately it feels like I cannot go a day or a week without talking about writer and director Gareth Huw Evans and his latest film, The Raid 2. Pure hype and excitement, followed growing impatience and total anxiety would be a good way to state how things have been for fans in the last nine months since the film wrapped principal photography and four months since Evans, joined by lead actor Iko Uwais and other select cast and crew members began touring the world over to promote the film. Fortunately after two weeks of limited releases, loyal fans including in North America, the U.K. and abroad will finally get to see the film starting this Friday, with further dates and locations to follow. And with all the praise the film has thusfar received in light of all the talk there has been about the third film of the franchise, Friday just can’t come fast enough.
One could also argue the anticipation that lingers in light of the long trickle of news updates on the current development of The Raid 3, which Evans has also gone on record declaring he would not touch on right away, while working on other films, including a seprtate martial arts movie that will bring Evans and Uwais back together. “…I don’t have any plans to do The Raid 3 within the next two or three years so I’m going to take a break from that franchise for a bit.” said Evans in a partial statement quoted from an interview with Crave Online late last month. “I want to do some bubthings outside of Indonesia for like two films, then come back to Indonesia and shoot The Raid 3. I have another one I want to shoot with him first. Still in the action genre and it’s something that [Uwais] needs to train for for a fair amount of time. You have to make good with some weaponry, my friend.”
Following up with that report is the latest interview with the actor now available at Screendaily where it is now being reported that after working on a seperate gangster action film titled Blister, he will work on that very same aforementioned martial arts movie, now back-to-back with The Raid 3. This obviously gives genre fans plenty of time to catch up on The Raid franchise while Evans continues to branch out to other ideas as a means of gaining further wisdom as a filmmaker to benefit the industry at home. “The idea is that if I do these projects outside Indonesia, I’m going to learn a lot and I can bring that back to the Indonesian film industry.” says Evans. “Indonesia gave me everything, if I hadn’t gone off to do that documentary [The Mystic Arts of Indonesia: Pencak Silat], I wouldn’t be here today.”
As for the current state of The Raid 3, with no other information except the film will take place two hours before The Raid 2 ends, Evans continued teasing about the film as he has been for quite a while now. “I’ve got an idea and I already know what the storyline is, and it’s such a departure from the previous two, …I already see it being smaller in terms of duration, but the scope and the scale is still big only on a different level, a bit more controlled. It’ll be fun to do.”
Only time will tell before we get to learn more about what that all possibly means by 2017, on top of what we can expect from the heavy duty training Evans mentions for Uwais earlier on in their standalone martial arts film. In the meantime, the two are serving as action director and fight choreographer for director Timo Tjahnanto’s new action thriller, The Night Comes For Us, which just locked its principal cast of new AND familiar faces led by actor Joe Taslim. And of course, the folks over at Merantau Films and XYZ Films are producing these gems, so I’m already dold.
On a seperate note, The Collective, joined by independent filmmaker and festival organizer Jeff Lunzaga have officially set the date for this year’s Herofest 2014 action movie festival to kick off on May 25, 2014 at the Berkeley Community Media in Berkeley, California.
And guess who is endorsing it?…
Better yet, just watch.
Source: Timo Tjahjanto
Stay tuned for more info!
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