Zo's Reviews: Impetigore

 


Woo…what the heck did I just watch?! (Sorry, Doug! Go follow him for some awesome content!)

Impetigore (original title Perempuan Tanah Jahanam) is an Indonesian folk-horror film written and directed by Indonesian director Joko Anwar (Satan’s Slaves) and stars Tara Basro as Maya, a young girl living in the big city who, after being attacked randomly by a machete-wielding psycho, begins to unravel a mystery about her life and must return to her home village where she will uncover the dark history (and curse) that plague it. With her is her friend Dini, played by Marissa Anita, who thinks she’s the heir to a big fortune and a massive mansion. But things soon begin to unravel the more the friends discover about the curse and the mystery of this village.

To begin, I’m going to let everyone know that this was my first Joko Anwar film. I’m unfamiliar with his previous works (which by the way are on Shudder so I have no excuse!) but I hear they’re great. I’m also a little unfamiliar with the Indonesian way of life, so some of the things that happened in the film kind of went over my head. But anyway, let’s dive into this film…

Of all the things I disliked about this movie, I would say the pacing is a little on the slow side for me. There were moments in the film where I kept questioning when something would happen. Also, the scares are few and far between. There are plot holes here and there that I found made it a little hard to keep track of. There were some weird moments I didn’t understand, but I’m thinking that that’s because I know very little of the culture, so maybe watching a few more Indonesian films I’ll begin to understand more. That’s more or less the bad…

As for the good…once this film hits the right scary and tense moments, it hits pretty hard. There are some very gory moments and, trigger warning, baby deaths…so those of you with weak stomachs for that kind of thing might want to skip this one. The gore itself varies from not so bad, to very disturbing. The acting was very well done, and I gotta hand it to Ario Bayu (who played Ki Saptadi) and Christine Hakim (Nyi Misni) who played son and daughter (respectively) and I thought stole the whole film for me. They varied in their roles from sympathetic to sad to desperate to downright terrifying. They’re the ones to watch, for sure, so keep your eyes on them. Christine Hakim commands the screen whenever she’s on it. The visual style of Joko Anwar also puts this strange yellowish tint on everything, which I found worked very well with the jungle backdrop; everything visually in this movie was something to behold.

Once the story starts hitting all the right beats and the terror truly starts to sink in, the viewer is left mouth agape at just how messed up this movie really is. The levels of violence all for the sake of lifting the curse on this village is just…insane. These people are desperate and they’ll do anything (ANYTHING) to lift this curse, and the audience is left shook. But the lulls in the movie are what leave it just short of being a masterpiece of foreign cinema. Don’t get me wrong though, I really did enjoy this film, and I think everyone should check it out. It’s streaming now exclusively on Shudder.

FINAL SCORE: B


For more reviews, follow me on Twitter (Zo) or check out some of the awesome writers and Horror Fam over at Horror Bound where myself and some other great folks write some just amazing content. Check us out!

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