Review: Santau

Santau follows in the footsteps of Jangan Tegur, Skrip 7077, Rasukan Ablasa, Momok the Movie dan Sifu & Tongga as the latest entry in the Malay horror film genre. Okay, Sifu & Tongga is not a horror movie but it was pretty horrifying. Hahaha.

But I digress...

Santau is about a well-to-do family who is unlucky enough to catch the ire and jealousy of someone who would resort to the black arts to ensure that the lucky family will be torn apart by tragedy and such.

Right at the beginning, the antagonists were set up for us to figure out. So we don't really know which one is the culprit... actually, I knew... straight away from that scene...

I don't know, maybe it's the writer in me or maybe the trailer has spoiled it for me... but I figured out the red herring early on... also, sometimes the casting can also reveal the storylines...

The entities in this film are not too scary. One of them... we can totally see through the makeup and recognize her as legendary actress, Mariani... the other one is a bit heavily made up so guess that one passes for an entity...

Which would bring me to the scare factor... the ambience of the movie was effective and the location chosen played a role in upping the scary levels... but as I said, one ghost was not scary enough... but this movie brings more of the yuck factor with the maggots and stuff in the food... *blerg*

Story-wise, it's not really new territory as Jangan Tegur has explored the realm of 'santau' also... and there were some bits in the movie that did not exactly gel... or needed...

Acting-wise... some parts were kinda horrible... like in the beginning of the movie, some of the dubbing was quite bad and some of the acting is kinda wooden... but towards the middle and the end, it got better...

So, how did Santau fare against the other horror movies? It's decent enough... but nothing to shout about or recommend to friends... just passable entertainment...

On a side note... why does most Malay horror films out this year (and last year) basically have the same formula? Take one family, put them a situation where an entity would haunt them, and then have them go to a bomoh/imam and the entity will be exorcised and they'd live happily ever after...

Histeria did not follow this formula... and it was still a decent horror movie... good even... I really enjoyed that one... hmm, Skrip 7077 is also one that did not follow the norm... but that movie was not exactly that scary... guess Rasukan Ablasa doesn't look like a copy of Jangan Pandang Belakang as well... Rasukan Ablasa is genuinely scary because it was really bad... all the screaming, good God, make it stop... hmm, Skrip 7077 and Rasukan Ablasa came from the same moviemaker yes?

Please someone make an 'out of the box' horror movie for next year...


P/S - Niyang Rapek looks set to be kinda awesome and scary...