No, The Yamashita Treasure Is Not In The Philippines!

Impressed with the move The Raid: Redemption, HBO Asia's first full length original film became a must see for me.  After finishing a productive meeting in Eastwood, I braved the incredible Ortigas traffic and headed to Megamall.  Apparently, the movie is shown only in select SM Cinemas.

I thought it is such a shame only a few people came to see it (for my screening time we were less than 10).  But as the movie progresses I started to understand why.  The movie is about a group of treasure hunters with their hired guns lured by the legend of Yamashita's Treasure.  Their search lead them to a remote Indonesian jungle.  Encountering a group of pirates, they sought refuge inside a dead mine but were unfortunately trapped when the mouth of the mine collapsed.  They realised the only way out is to journey further into the mine.  Aside from the words, Yamashita Treasure, the plot seems to be a cliche.  Treasure hunt and Murphy's law in effect.

The make up is quite good.  The costumes aren't so bad either.  I also think that it offered a very Hollywoody cinematography.  Unfortunately, those are the only good things I can say about the movie.  It's your typical treasure hunt movie where the proponents of the expedition kept secrets from the whole party, the hired guns get mad as they start to lose men and demand answers.  Of course there's more to it that what the greedy proponents are willing to share. They find monsters instead of gold and they all die.

I would have liked it if other elements of the movie were good.  The casting is poor.  The group of hired soldiers seem to not know how to use their guns (Spoiler Alert).  The pirates who ambushed them were not even using any cover and yet they cant seem to hit them.  They also dont possess any skill in hand to hand combat.  The leader of the hired guns Ario Bayu (Capt Tino) I think can be better played by Joe Talsim (Djoko).  Joe was kiss ass in The Raid and Ario is just so lame.  Les Loveday (Price) was also a let down as he fails to be the rich but obnoxious leader of the hunt.  And same can be said to her love interest Carmen Soo (Su-ling) who tried so hard to be over bearing.  The narrative also needs some work.  The pacing is so slow.  Lastly, the scientific research, human-testing of bio weapons angle can be interesting only if it was supported by the production design.

I really had high hopes for the film considering its an HBO Original movie.  But unfortunately, it failed to deliver.