By Nik Liyana
The best thing about hanging out with a friend and prioritising on spending time as our purpose is that we might spontaneously decide to watch a movie together and spontaneously go to the next airing movie and that was how we watched Mangkujiwo 2 (2023) with no previous knowledge of the plot. To sum it up from what I have understood, (spoilers ahead!) Uma, the main character, is haunted by a ghost named Kunti, who kills those who hurt her when she is unconscious. The male lead, Rimba, the photographer, visits the town to investigate the death of his father and finds out that Brotoseno (Uma’s father) is behind his father’s death. They fight and Rimba accidentally hurts Uma which evokes Kunti’s wrath. My favourite elements of Mangkujiwo 2 are that the antagonist actually wins and the soundtrack is good (I am actually jamming to the theme song ‘Si Pelakon’ as I write this) but the story execution is just okay.
The best character in this movie has to be Brotoseno! He can be described as a twisted character who would stop at nothing to achieve his goals. Brotoseno successfully manipulates the main character, Uma, into loving him as a father while he uses her ability to summon Kunti towards his advantage. Brotoseno's wickedness and apathy is further shown when he does not hesitate to rape Uma whom he has raised since baby, which contrasts jarringly with Uma's pure love towards Brotoseno.
One of my favourite moments is when Brotoseno believes in and depends on Uma's love towards him, that she will protect him, and uses it to ensure that Rimba would accidentally hurt Uma in their struggle leading him to his demise. I just think it is so vile of him, but in a good way, to use Uma to kill the only person who genuinely cares for her. Immediately in the next shot, Uma is chained with a swollen stomach as he plans to use their child to control Kunti. A few flashbacks reveal that Brotoseno has always been evil and planned to use Kunti ever since the first movie so I am glad his decade of evil will continue and not be thwarted due to a random photographer. We love a great villain!
The story is rich and is not just horror for the sake of horror. The origin of the ghost Kunti is revealed to the male lead and audience at the right time for enough sense of "plot twist" and shock value. Even so, it feels as though the movie bites more than it can chew. If, for me, the best part of the storytelling is the plot twist, then I would have had a different experience with the movie had I already watched the prequel. It uses a lot of "tell" to explain the story; the three main antagonists sitting around a table and talking about their plan have more screen time than the ghost Kunti, the supposed main attraction of the horror movie. Many jump cuts are used arbitrarily which broke the immersion in the movie. For example, in a scene where Rimba and Uma fight a supporting antagonist, Kunti has been summoned and kills the antagonist while Rimba and Uma are injured and then, the next scene jumps to Rimba enjoying an event as if that was just a normal day for him.
Furthermore, many people (me included) agree that the movie marketed itself as horror but the supposed horror element only got 15 minutes of screentime at most. I am not sure whether I should be happy or not about this because I am actually scared of ghosts but I do somehow feel disappointed at the lack of horror. I understand that a horror story is not about how many times a movie freaks you out and it is more about the build-up, but Mangkujiwo 2 does not have that. The build-up is the conversation (and that’s it!), the ghost disappears as fast as it manifests.
In conclusion, the movie Mangkujiwo 2 has a great antagonist with a rich story but falls flat on the execution and I give it a 2/5 on Letterboxd.
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