The Raid (2011)

Elevator Pitch: A SWAT team in Jakata are tasked with attacking a fortified tenement controlled by a drug lord., with the objective of shutting down its drug processing factory. They are successful in entering the building but are seen by a lookout who alerts the drug lord. He in turn offers reward for anyone who can dispose of the police, making them targets for men with machine guns, sniper rifles, knives and machetes. As they are forced to do battle it becomes doubtful if any of them will survive.

Content: Just to set the scene we see the drug lord execute a number of people with a revolver, and when it run out of amo, with a hammer. The attack is initiated and it can be seen that the team are well trained, but once they are detected they are overwhelmed. There is a lot of machine gun fire and much hand to hand combat using a variety of martial arts (apparently). Also a bit of torture. Almost continuous tension from the start, and once the villains are unleashed, a lot of shouting.

A View: This was a very low budget production, and has been much admired due to the creative competence of the writer/director/editor. It got high marks on Rotten Tomatoes but Roger Ebert, usually the most forgiving of critics, disliked it intensely, and has revisited it to justify his review. I did not like it either due to the extremely protracted hand to hand combats, sometimes taking place when someone discards a firearm, unacceptable in my view. I could not recommend it but if you like the idea try “Dredd”, the same plot but much cleverer.

Additional Info: There was a sequel with a bigger budget, apparently more of the same.