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'Mencuri Raden Saleh' review: The Gen-Z caper is a campy, flawed romp
The heist flick, starring Iqbaal Ramadhan, Angga Yunanda and Rachel Amanda, could have become a landmark moment the Indonesian film industry desperately needs. Unfortunately, its director's less-compelling cinematic habit still lingers.
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The leading thieves: Iqbaal Ramadhan and Angga Yunanda lead the cast of 'Mencuri Raden Saleh', a caper flick directed by Angga Dwimas Sasongko. (Instagram/Mencuri Raden Saleh) (Instagram/Mencuri Raden Saleh)
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em>The heist flick, starring Iqbaal Ramadhan, Angga Yunanda and Rachel Amanda, could have become a landmark moment the Indonesian film industry desperately needs. Unfortunately, its director's less-compelling cinematic habit still lingers.
Director Angga Dwimas Sasongko is aiming for the stars.
His latest directorial and writing feature, Mencuri Raden Saleh (Stealing Raden Saleh) might be his most ambitious project to date, considering the film's relatively-unknown central cast (with a few legends thrown in), the staggering run time of two hours and 34 minutes, and the fact that instead of going to straight to streaming services, he is adamant on releasing the film in theaters.
The official trailer alone promises everything that moviegoers might have never seen in any Indonesian film before: historical paintings, adrenaline-filled car chases, a meticulous robbery, senior actor Tyo Pakusadewo's nefarious smirk and Atiqah Hasiholan with a bob haircut.
Life of crime
Desperate to pay for his imprisoned father's legal attorney, Piko (Iqbaal Ramadhan) and his best friend Ucup (Angga Yunanda) decides to accept an offer given by art curator, Dini (Atiqah Hasiholan) to replicate an 1857 painting by Indonesian artistic figure Raden Saleh titled “The Arrest of Pangeran Diponegoro”.
The acclaimed work of art depicts the capture of Prince Diponegoro of the Yogyakarta Sultanate by Lieutenant General Hendrik Merkus de Kock in front of the colonial officer's residence, taking place on Mar. 28, 1830.
Unfortunately, there is more to the offer than meets the eye. After submitting the replica, Dini's employer, a fictional former president of Indonesia named Permadi (Tyo Pakusadewo) blackmails Piko, his girlfriend Sarah (Aghniny Haque) and Ucup. In exchange for a more sizable cash reward, they must steal the original painting of “The Arrest of Pangeran Diponegoro” that is about to be exhibited to the public.
Understanding the difficult task at hand, the three decide to recruit more help, each of whom harbors their respective reason for joining in the heist: the half-brothers Gofar and Tuktuk (Umay Shahab and Ari Irham, respectively) and Fella (Rachel Amanda).
Making things more complicated, hot on their trail are two detectives Arman and Sita (Ganindra Bimo and his real-life wife, Andrea Dian). Eventually, the heist takes various twists and turns as more characters are involved, namely Fella's handler, Gito (Tegar Satrya), Permadi's son, Rama (Muhammad Khan) and Piko's father himself (Dwi Sasono).
A different approach
Writer-director Angga Dwimas Sasongko should receive kudos for daring himself to try and make a heist film. Mencuri Raden Saleh is only his third directorial feature in the action realm, following 2018's Wiro Sableng: Pendekar Kapak Maut Naga Geni 212 (Wiro Sableng: Dragon Death Ax Sword Warrior Geni 212) and early this year's Ben & Jody.
The director seems to have held nothing back when it comes to creating enough technical magic for the film's action-packed sequences. The cat-and-mouse game between the young thieves and the not-so-young detectives is delivered Hollywood-style—complete with damaged cars and the throbbing Sudirman central business district in the background.
Unlike his previous features, such as the 2016 prestige drama Surat Dari Praha (Letter from Prague) and the 2020 family affair Nanti Kita Cerita Tentang Hari Ini (We Will Talk About This Day) the director seems to intentionally forgo the art of nuance, but instead, gunning for maximalism to the point of unintended campiness.
The police station where Arman and Sita work, for instance, bears little dissimilarity to the one where detectives work in American police procedural dramas, such as Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. The prison that detains Piko's father is practically the dingier version of the one in The Shawshank Redemption.
It might have easily come across as corny, but thanks to Angga's meticulous commitment to his vision, the audience would likely accept his invitation to cease overthinking and simply embrace this heightened version of the Big Durian.
Serving as the film's cinematographer, Bagoes Tresna Aji manages to execute a color palette that matches his director's vision without coming across as a two-hour-plus beauty ad. In the case of Mencuri Raden Saleh, the devil is in the details—the lighting hues and shades, case in point, are deliberately orchestrated by matching them to whatever emotional toil that the character in the scene is going through at the moment.
Handling the make-up and wardrobe department, Chassey Julian and Marcello Hizky might have taken a page or two from the Korean drama wave—every single character, principal and otherwise, is designated with a distinctive physical attribute, all the way to the characters' jewelry and hairstyle. There is very little chance that the audience would mistake one character for another, no matter how significant (or insignificant) they are to the plot.
As if Angga Dwimas Sasongko and his crew deemed the final product not bombastic enough, the film's score, handled by Abel Huray and F.A.M.E.'S. Project, rarely leaves a single scene muted—the background notation ranges from chest-thumping orchestral rhapsody for the nail-biting sequences to the whimsical, James Bond-esque organum for the scenes that are, rather flagrantly, the auteur's homage to the caper genre.
Again: No subtlety is found here, only all-out theft-o-mania.
What to gain, what to lose
Angga Dwimas Sasongko and cowriter Husein M. Atmodjo might aim for a bombastic, campy frisk, but unfortunately, just like any criminal agenda, such a decision comes with consequences.
A heightened realism could only work when the actors can offset their off-the-wall characterizations and the outlandish situations their characters find themselves in with believability and layered nuances. However, when subtlety is ditched by not only the film's writer-director, but also the actors, it results in a few moments when Mencuri Raden Saleh inadvertently reduces itself from an exorbitant flight of fancy into an action flick with little character study.
Considering the film's genre and Angga Dwimas Sasongko's atypical vision, Mencuri Raden Saleh might be a cinematic left turn that is too toilsome for the principal cast—most of whom have rarely stepped their foot outside the rom-com territory.
More often than not, instead of unearthing more of their respective character's psyches and their relatable desperation, Iqbaal Ramadhan and Angga Yunanda would end up—consciously or not—relying on their boyish charisma to “sell” their characters. This strategy might prove endearing to the female moviegoers, but likely not so much to the male and older ones.
Both young thespians have proven their star quality in their prior work, and they should have used Mencuri Raden Saleh as their opportunity to prove that they have the chops of a character actor as well. For whatever reason, they did not.
The most valuable player (MVP) of Mencuri Raden Saleh, surprisingly, is the actor whose character is perhaps the most inadequately written: Rachel Amanda. Thanks to the 27-year-old actress' prior, long tenure in soap operas, she seems to understand what to do with a character and, more importantly, what not to do. Rachel Amanda manages to inject her relatively frustrating character with a dose of charisma that hints at both vulnerability and world-weariness.
Even so, the facile characterization suffered by Rachel Amanda's Fella and Aghniny Haque's Sarah—not to mention, their disappointingly limited screen time in a largely masculine film—proves that, after more than 10 years in the game, Angga Dwimas Sasongko has yet to figure out how to craft a layered, well-rounded heroine for his silver screen.
Mencuri Raden Saleh is an eye-pleasing escapism. The twists and turns are commendable and may serve as an inspiring example of which Angga Dwimas Sasongko's fellow filmmakers should take some notes. Does it break new ground, creativity-wise? Yes, of course. It is not everyday we get to see an Indonesian filmmaker coming up with such a grandiose vision.
However, does it break new ground, industry-wise? Well, not really.
When it is dissected to its core, Mencuri Raden Saleh is, nonetheless, a story of (largely) male experience with two leading men at its front and center. If only the roles had been reversed and Rachel Amanda's Fella and Aghniny Haque's Sarah had taken on the lead instead, perhaps the film could have become a groundbreaking landmark Angga has been aiming for all along.
Mencuri Raden Saleh is available to watch in theaters across Indonesia.
