Mizi Movie Review: Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa

Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa (HMM) is a fantasy epic film produced by KRU Studios and directed by one of the KRU brothers, Yusry Abd Halim. It is reported as the second Malaysian big budgeted film(RM8mil) after Puteri Gunung Ledang(RM16mil). The movie heavily makes use of CGI in which has rather becoming a trademark for anything KRU has ever produce. We can see a trend of the current crops of KRU movies moving away from the typical genres of Malay films such as romantic comedies, drama and horror. Which I think is a good thing as it gives us variety of flavor and challenges the boundaries of local talent film-making.

I feel that KRU should be given the praise for making this kind of movies and hopefully continue to improve and raise the bar higher for Malaysian films.

Now for the story. HMM is LOOSELY based on the ancient scripture of Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa or The Kedah Annals chronicling the history of a kingdom of Langkasuka which is an old Malay kingdom that predates the Malacca Sultanate. Some historian believe Langkasuka was in Kedah but some also believe in Pattani. It is in the subject of Form 1 Secondary School history syllabus which is most of us are familiar with. It is more fairy-tale like scripture than a historical dossier. Since I don't think the average Malaysian would actually read the original text, so I can forgive the if the film is actually far off from the original source. This would also I think would provide the challenges of characterization and it is up to Yusry imagination to interpret Merong Mahawangsa.

In a nutshell, HMM is about the titular character was asked to escort the prince of Rome, Marcus (which from the opening was said that from Emperor Hadrian, though in actual history Hadrian never had a son) to be married with the princess from China. The meeting place is at the Golden Khersonese, which one of the old names of the Malay Peninsular given by Greek historian Ptolemy. Upon reaching the shore of what we may presume would be modern day Kedah or even Penang, the Sino-Roman emissary was attack by the so called Geruda clan, the princess and her handmaiden were kidnapped and Marcus seem to be lost at sea. Merong on the other hand, while displaying much of his masculine prowess  machoness fighting the Gerudas, was beaten badly and later saved by Kesum and Embok. Kesum, some sort of the village shaman, told Merong that of a prophecy that he is their saviour and destined to be their king.

Now for me the movie was enjoyable. And I believe that most Malaysian will enjoy it too with being over critical. However I feel the plot lacks originality. You kinda get the feeling that you have seen these type of situation before. Sort of like Yusry mashed up bits from other epic movies such as Pirates of the Carribean, 300, King Arthur,Troy and Braveheart. For a movie buff like me this seem too obvious and not well disguised. But for most Malaysian this seem not so much of a problem but if they decide to make HMM2, I surely hope they take a note of this.

My second gripe is the language. There are 4 languages spoken in this movie; English, Malay, Chinese and Latin. Now the original text was in Sanskrit, so in real, Merong would have probably spoken in Sanskrit since it was assume he was a Buddhist. Even his name sound Sanskrit in origin. It would have been OK if the movie was entirely in English or Malay or maybe a combination of both then it would have achieve a willing suspension of disbelief. Now why I would ask Marcus and the Romans speak English while the princess acknowledges the fact that Latin language does exist within the context of the movie and utter a few Latin phrases? For info, the English language during this time was not fully developed and would probably only be spoken by the Saxons. That one short scene where the princess was speaking Latin ruin it for me. Plus if in this movie the Chinese language was spoken, why does the princess and the handmaiden speaking English among themselves? And nobody in Goa speak Indian?We can believe the impossible but not the improbable.

One more thing, and this is minor at best, horses are not indigenous to Malay Peninsular. There are scene that Kesum and Taji riding a horse. This would be improbable. So I hope Yusry to take note.

On the acting side, well for a movie like this, it doesn't have to be Oscar material but Stephen Rahman-Hughes is decent enough. But why I see him prefer to fight without weapons in most of the fight scenes with the Gerudas? I have heard many said that Ummi Nazeera as Embok is pretty 'kaku' and we dont see much chemistry between Embok and Merong. Maybe due to the fact that Yusry mentioned he have to compress a lot than he had hope for. Dato Rahim Razali does gives us his usual first class performance and also Wan Hanafi Su as Taji the main villain. Overall acting is pretty O.K. A pretty good move I think to re imagine Geruda as a tattooed invincible pirate clan rather than the mythical bird. This in effect gives the story much more depth.

The effects and CGI is the best by MALAYSIAN STANDARD but I would say we are still far from Hollywood. You can compare with similar type of film, a Thai movie called Queen of Langkasuka (which incidentally also about the Kingdom of Langkasuka). In my opinion, Queen of Langkasuka CGI is a bit better.

Overall this was a good movie and it was a good experience watching it. Many will love it. And I would foresee many movies such this to from local filmmakers.