TheJakartaPost

Please Update your browser

Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.

Jakarta Post

Crazy little thing called modern comedy

Courtesy of MD PicturesIt was not without a thorough study that comedy trio Dono, Kasino and Indro — known as the legendary Warkop DKI — initiated the release of their films, two titles every year on average from 1979 to 1994

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Sat, September 19, 2015

Share This Article

Change Size

Crazy little thing called modern comedy

Courtesy of MD Pictures

It was not without a thorough study that comedy trio Dono, Kasino and Indro '€” known as the legendary Warkop DKI '€” initiated the release of their films, two titles every year on average from 1979 to 1994.

With their educational background in social and political studies, they realized that the majority of Indonesian movie viewers at that time belonged to the middle-to-low social brackets seeking respite from hard work.

All 34 titles of Warkop DKI films were screened at major cinemas and the group became the highest-paid entertainers in the film industry in the era before the rise of television as the most popular entertainment source.

'€œWe released new films every Idul Fitri and New Year holidays as a strategy to stave off foreign films so people would watch Indonesian films instead,'€ said Indro, the only surviving member of the group.

But the nationalistic romanticism was not the only selling factor of the films, nor the reason Indro took part in the production of Komedi Moderen '€¦ Gokil (Modern Comedy '€¦ that'€™s Crazy) released on Sept. 17.

The film, with English subtitles, uses the same formula as Warkop DKI, which according to Indro, was an integral part of all Indonesians who grew up in the 1980s and 1990s.

All Warkop DKI films are characterized by a sequence of skits portraying urban life. With characters of different ethnic groups and cultures to depict the melting pot of Jakarta, and slapstick scenes involving women in sexy outfits, Warkop DKI films are a genre unto themselves.

These signature strengths are adopted in Komedi Moderen, tailored to suit this day and age and make old, overused jokes sound, or look, hilarious.

Indro plays a retired colonel living in a big house with a swimming pool. With his wife Maya (Maya Wulan), he rents out rooms in the house: ground floor for men, female tenants in the upstairs rooms with the couple'€™s daughter Karin.

Friends Boris (Boris Bokir) and Dodit (Dodit Mulyanto) are new occupants who slowly gain the trust of their hosts and get acquainted with Karin and her friend Sasha (Nadine Alexandra).

Boris, a member of the Batak ethnic group, and Javanese Dodit later find jobs as private detectives and get the feisty Maya as their first client. The pair soon gets into hot water with retired military general Goen (Tarzan), the owner of the agency they work for.

It'€™s a happy-ending story, with Boris and Dodit deciding to resign and pursue careers as standup comics instead.

In real life, Boris and Dodit are both comics who gained popularity as participants of a scouting program for stand-up comics on Kompas TV, on which Indro was one of the judges.

Although Dodit'€™s catchphrases gokil (Jakarta slang for '€œcrazy'€) and '€œso sweet'€ were included in the film, he was not the star.

The absence of heartfelt emotion on his part was one of the reasons '€” talking slowly with an inexpressive look is his act-out that quickly gets tiring, but the rest of the cast showed decent acting skills that made the film fun to watch.

The appearance of sexy dangdut singers Duo Serigala was merely to please the male audience, with about as much relevance to the plot as a scene in which a young woman strips to her bikini in a hotel elevator.

It was a plausible effort from the script team to also include well-known Warkop DKI phrases such as '€œYang baju merah, amankan'€ (Keep your eyes on the woman in red) and give a cameo appearance to award-winning actor Lukman Sardi.

Director Cuk FK, who has helmed many comedy films, however, failed to give a '€œmodern'€ touch to the film, allowing long pauses between frames and relying on crowd-pleasing tropes, rather than attempting to update Warkop DKI films.

If Warkop DKI used Henry Mancini'€™s '€œThe Entertainer'€ tunes for its films, the opening score of old song '€œPepaya Mangga Pisang Jambu'€ (Papaya Manggo Banana Rose Apple) used in Komedi Moderen has a similar effect, lasting in the viewer'€™s minds long after ending.

The film could appease the longing for stupidly funny comedy or perhaps could be seen as a new dawn for the genre.  Either way, let'€™s hope it gets people back into the cinema.

{

Your Opinion Matters

Share your experiences, suggestions, and any issues you've encountered on The Jakarta Post. We're here to listen.

Enter at least 30 characters
0 / 30

Thank You

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. We appreciate your feedback.