I am sure most Malaysian have been waiting for tales and a so called epic movie from this 1- Land which on par with Hollywood outcomes. The name and the promotion of Merong Mahawangsa have made me take a doorstep to KLCC on the first day show.The story is based so-loosely on the 16th century historical document entitled ‘The Malay Annals’, ’The Chronicles of Merong Mahawangsa’ is an action-packed epic feature film, with mythical characters, magical moments and dazzling visual-effects sequences. Sadly the bad colors rendering on cinematography spoilt this movie. The credit on camera just focusing on the many ships, the sets, and costumes. . Merong Mahawangsa was supposedly a descendant of Alexander the Great, a renowned naval captain and traveler who came to Asia several hundred years ago but this movie failed to explain who he is except from the voice of narrator. The English conversation between by the Marcus (Roman prince), Merong and the Chinese prince is a common English language and it sounds modern. It can be sense from some of modern words using likes rationally, logically and stupid were being spoken while we knew it supposed to be classical English should be applied to make the movie more real. I don’t read the Hikayat but I believe this is shouldn’t be the direction of the movie.
The year is 120 AD… a time when the Roman Empire is at the height of its power, during the reign of Hadrian – one of the Five Good Emperors. Meanwhile in China, the Han Dynasty is firmly cemented as the ruling empire and is expanding into Central Asia… one hundred years before the period of the Three Kingdoms. While this movie failed to tell us about the dynasty and stuff and can you just imagine the Han Dynasty actually passed their English Triple One Nine? Most characters here really damn good in Modern English except Embok and Pak Kesum while Merong able to converse both languages.
As the Roman fleet did their repairs and traded in Goa, they asked Merong Mahawangsa to escort a Roman prince to Southeast Asia, to wed a beautiful Chinese princess from the Han Dynasty. But here the way they trade Merong is a litle bit cruel well if I was the Prince , it is better for me to make the first choice , paid the gold to Mano Maniam and the business dealt. The Chinese princess and the Roman prince are supposed to meet halfway and be married on neutral grounds and they met at Malaysia to get married.. haa haa. What a silly thing with the white tentages like a J- LO wedding ceremony..
Visual wise is most likely you watch 300 and Pirates of Caribbean but the storyline is so dull. None of characters is successfully strong and not even the hero of the movie.
The bad characters of the movie are Kamawas and Taji who representing Garuda kingdom which I don’t quite agree when Garuda is being picturized as an island and a government. I thought of in the real story it should be a mighty big bird with the superstitious thing. They decided to kidnap the Chinese princess and use her as ransom. En route to the Straits of Melaka, Merong Mahawangsa’s fleet was attacked by Geruda’s forces while stopping at a small island to replenish supplies.
Will Merong Mahawangsa be able to rescue the Princess and re-unite her with her betrothed in a marriage that is set to bring together two great civilizations from the East and West and ha ha..ha Merong is actually the members of Mensa Club who has a good IQ. He buys the idea of Archimedes and cleverly used the mirror to destroy the enemies. The scene looks so silly and cheap idea when the armies felt down from the ship after being attacked by the mirror.
We are lucky because before he died, Merong had a chance to have a sexual intercourse with Embok and that’s why we exist now.
It is such a weak movie like we eat a plate of rice without any additional dishes. Empty, raw and loose.
Karmically, watching a bad movie with Sabri, bad things happened. He left the parking ticket at the machine.
