enowned director Hanung Bramantyo is said to bring the life and struggles of the king of Mataram, Sultan Agung, to the silver screen.
Entitled Sultan Agung: Tahta, Perjuangan dan Cinta (Sultan Agung: Throne, Struggles and Love), the film is produced by the owner or beauty brand Mustika Ratu, B.R.A. Mooryati Soedibyo. The biopic will feature actor Ario Bayu as Sultan Agung and Anindya Kusuma Putri as Ratu Batang (Queen Batang), permaisuri or the wife of Sultan Agung himself.
According to Antara news agency, the large-scale film which plans to feature 500 cast members is also said to involve horse soldiers and war elephants to portray the moment when Sultan Agung sieged Batavia.
In the beginning, Hanung was interested to make the biopic of Sultan Agung because he thought only a few people within the film industry who wanted to make it as a film although the king actually existed in the past. He also wanted to fulfill Mooryati’s dream of creating a film about Sultan Agung.
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Meanwhile, for Mooryati, Sultan Agung had the vision to unite the islands although they were separated at that time due to a power struggle. At that time the archipelago was also under the Dutch colonialism.
“I present this film for the nation to enhance the unity,” Hanung said, adding that currently, he is still looking for other cast members. “This film is also made for the young generation so they will know and appreciate the struggle of our heroes [in the past], one of them was Sultan Agung.”
Ario Bayu, who previously acted as Indonesia’s founding father Soekarno in the 2013 biopic, also by Hanung Bramantyo, admitted that he was grateful for being able to be involved in the film. “When I starred in ‘Soekarno’, I felt like I was entering a time machine to the struggle era, but [in this film] it seems like I will get into a deeper time machine,” he said. (wir/asw)
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