It completely blew me away. If you think Malay movies are the sort of mediocre stuff (I wanted to use a much stronger and impolite word) that the likes of David Teo churns out (Mami Jarum, I'm Not Single and all that rubbish), Dain Said represents the other end of the scale. It's been a very long time since I've seen a movie that stays with me for a long time after watching it. Claude Berri's Jean de Florette (though of a completely different genre) was one of those. I'm also getting this terrible urge to watch Bunohan again. This time I'm going to watch it with my wife. I didn't bring her as I thought the violence might be a bit too much but having watched it, I would say its poetic beauty transcends its brutality. The pace is very slow and restless. You're not quite sure what's going on. Or where the movie is heading. Until the very end. And even then you're not quite sure whether you got all of it. It is also steeped in culture. A glimpse of a remote corner of Malaysia that you rarely get to see. Strong performances all round, particularly Faizal Hussein, Zahiril Adzim, Pekin Ibrahim, Tengku Azura and Namron. Even Hushairy Hussin as Jolok, the local sleeze. Dain Said must have clocked in many hours at the repertory cinemas (I recall him saying so in an interview) and the influences certainly show. The last time I felt like this was after seeing Andrei Tarkovsky's The Sacrifice. I'm going for a second viewing.
