Kuntilanak 3 – review

Director: Rizal Mantovani

Release date: 2022

Contains spoilers

This is the third in a series that could have realistically been called Kids vs Kuntilanak. I’d looked at the first in the series under the heading Vamp or Not? as, whilst the Indonesian kuntilanak is analogous to the Western vampire, the depiction in movies is not always so. For this reason the second film was explored through its tropes as there wasn’t anything vampiric going on.

demonstrating powers

This film is vampiric – there is energy vampirism – it has also taken the franchise and directed it well away from the others in the series. It follows Dinda, one of a group of orphans, and the original actress, Sandrinna Michelle, has been replaced by Nicole Rossi (the other kids are played by the actors from the first two films). In the last film we discovered she was of the kuntilanak worshipping Mangkujiwo bloodline and she killed the kuntilanak at the end of that film. This has left her with powers and at the head of the film we see her as the siblings, especially Miko (Ali Fikry), are being bullied, losing her temper, levitating rocks and psychically flinging them at the bullies.

making new friends

However, after a prank gone wrong sees her hospitalising Ambar (Ciara Nadine Brosnan) and Panji (Adlu Fahrezi), she asks their foster mother (Nena Rosier) if she can attend a special school – there is no address but as soon as she asks, the school phones. So, what we then have is her attending this school for kids with powers and the film kind of morphs into Harry Potter meets the X-Men. At home Miko and Kresna (Andryan Bima) see something online about the school, a missing kid and kuntilanak (so much for a secret school) and so find the school and sneak in. A good teacher helps them blend in as they are trying to protect Dinda from the bad teachers.

feeding on energy

What we discover is that the wife of the (deceased) founder of the school has merged with a kuntilanak (so, to a degree, we have vampiric possession) and this keeps her young but only if she feeds on a kid. This occurs once per year. However, being the last Mangkujiwo (I’m assuming direct bloodline and not sect, which is active) and a kuntilanak slayer, if she feeds from Dinda it’ll hold her for eighty years. The school is mostly staffed by members of the sect. When the kuntilanak feeds we can see the energy drawn from the victim.

the kuntilanak

The film side-lines two of the kids and introduces some new friends at the school but really did nothing within the narrative to build a friendship – they were just immediately friends. The film also eschewed an older (adult) sister altogether. The idea that Dinda was developing into something special because of her brush with the supernatural and her heritage wasn’t a bad one – the school itself felt like a lazy amalgam of the franchises I mentioned and the plot relied on a massive suspension of disbelief (such as no-one knowing the evil headmaster was evil). Not a great ending to the series, but at least we got actual vampirism. 3.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Use of Tropes: Kuntilanak 2

Rizal Mantovani’s 2019 film is a sequel to a film that I looked at as a ‘Vamp or Not?’ and concluded that it might be Vamp if one accepted that an aspect of the film portrayed energy vampirism. The film itself was a mix of horror and a kid’s movie, about a group of orphans – 3 young boys, 2 young girls and an older sister (and her boyfriend). The sequel concerns the same family group… except that the older sister is no longer there and has been replaced with a new older sister, Julia (Susan Sameh), and her boyfriend Edwin (Maxime Bouttier). Where she has come from is anyone’s guess – though there is a throwaway mention of potentially returning to LA.

Kuntilanak Eyes

The film starts with a man entering a cellar and kneeling before what looks like a cross between a shrine and a portal, in the cellar wall, to another world (which it literally is). He performs a ritual and the shape of a kuntilanak (when we see her later, she has taken a human’s appearance and is played by Karina Suwandhi) appears within the corridor and comes towards him. Addressing her as Highness he says that he has freed her and asks for the boon of being taught black magic. She makes hand movements above his head and he dies.

the cellar portal

At a carnival, Dinda (Sandrinna Michelle) is desperately searching for youngest of the orphans Ambar (Ciara Nadine Brosnan), who has wandered off. Miko (Ali Fikry) is also searching, though Kresna (Andryan Bima) and Panji (Adlu Fahrezi) have distracted themselves at one of the fairground games. Julia is searching also, though Edwin is not so much use as he keeps trying to chill and meditate to counter the stress. Kresna wins a teddy and they get in an altercation with some other boys, who try to steal it and the head gets ripped off.

the boys

Dinda sees Ambar walking in the crowd and chases after her but Ambar seems unresponsive. Eventually we see her atop a (closed) Ferris wheel, seemingly asleep (or in a trance) a shape moving behind her when Dinda’s voice on a walkie talkie brings her round. When she is brought down, she claims a beautiful woman led her to the wheel – kuntilanak they all say, bar Edwin who is skeptical, especially when they suggest they have met one.

Karmilla and Dinda

So, a woman pitches up at the house and speaks to the foster mom (Nena Rosier) claiming to be Karmila, Dinda’s biological mother. This is our first trope, I can’t believe the name was used for any reason than to intertextually tie into Carmilla. Obviously, the name gives the viewer a red flag and she is the kuntilanak. She claims to have spoken to the orphanage but offers no documentary proof and leaves a map to her house in the forest. Dinda has overheard it all.

child ghost

She wants to go and visit her mother but foster mom says she needs to check things out. Dinda, who has taken the map, sleeps and dreams of a tree and a beating heart, on waking she resolves to sneak away but is caught by Julia who suggests that if the mom will allow it, she will go with her. All the other kids say they’ll go too. Like a diligent foster mom, permission is given for all her wards to go visit the mysterious woman, miles away in a forest, who claims without proof to be the biological mom, whilst she gets more information… well if she didn’t there wouldn’t be much of a film. The kids end up in a cabin in the woods, Edwin gets haunted and then possessed by two child ghosts known to accompany kuntilanak and for some reason Karmila plays house for a while before supernaturally terrorising everyone (bar Dinda).

claiming Dinda

The full story is that Dinda’s parents (whose family name was Karmila) were part of the Mangkujiwo bloodline, who worship the kuntilanak and, as part of their pact, they all have to offer the creature their first born (incidentally there are spin off films entitled Mangkujiwo). Dinda’s mother did not want to give her to the creature, dropped her at the orphanage and then she and her husband (T. Rifnu Wikana) sealed her in the kuntilanak’s otherworldly forest Ujung Sedo and died as part of that sealing. The kuntilanak deems Dinda as her own.

stabbing the heart

Her actions are not particularly vampiric, though on occasion her mouth splits a bit like the reaper strain in Blade 2. We do see her head chopped off and then reattached and she can float around. When she captures the kids, they are held within roots at the centre of Ujung Sedo. One could imagine that the tree will drain their life force, but it isn’t stated. If this is the case then the tree is intimately linked to the kuntilanak. Dinda is given an ornate hairpin belonging to her real mother and is able to injure the kuntilanak and ward her with it. However, stabbing in the head does not kill the creature (unlike in the first film). She sees that the tree has a heart in its centre – we can assume the kuntilanak’s heart – and staking it with the hair pin kills the creature and frees the kids. It is analogous to staking a western vampire.

warding evil

So there are our two tropes – staking in the (detached) heart and Karmila/Carmilla. There might be feeding on life force but it is a fanciful guess rather than a sure thing. The child actors are of a varying level of skill but Andryan Bima offers a stand out performance, with Ali Fikry not far behind. Like the first film this struggles with its nature as a kids facing film conflicting with the horror that it wants to portray. Some of the story is too silly (like letting all her wards just go and visit the mysterious woman she has met for 5-minutes). The imdb page is here.

Dark Whispers: Volume 1 – review

Directors: Lucy Gouldthorpe & Katrina Irawati Graham (segments)

Release date: 2019

Contains spoilers

Dark Whispers is a portmanteau film with a wraparound that sees a woman, Clara (Andrea Demetriades), sorting out the effects left by her deceased mother. Among them is the book Dark Whispers, which she starts to read – until the book unnerves her but then she finds she cannot destroy it and must continue reading.

Not a shock to discover that the shorts – which seem to have been previously made shorts, as is often the case – make up the stories of the book. Whilst they do contain supernatural elements the film didn’t feel horror to me, more thriller with almost a Tales of the Unexpected vibe to some. The shorts are all directed by female directors. We are looking at this for one film in particular plus a vampire connection in another.

a bite

The vampire film is called Grillz and was directed by Lucy Gouldthorpe. Milla (Lucy Gouldthorpe) is playing the online dating game and is getting a lewd suggestion from one prospective beau. He doesn’t show for a liaison so she meets a second, username Derwentparkdreamboat (Jared Goldsmith). Whilst they are having a drink we notice that her teeth seem too numerous for her mouth. Later, in an underpass, she comes on to him, but as she bites his neck she breaks her canine teeth – an accident that does not help her date, however.

new fangs

Her next search online leads her to look for a date with a dentist, and she successfully hooks up with Graham (Tosh Greenslade). On their date she is self-consciously hiding her teeth, he makes her show him and takes her to his surgery. Some dentistry magic and she has some fancy metal fangs… But what will be his reward for such an act of altruism? That I won't spoil but we can note that the vampire in this has a reflection. It is a short, short – only around the 5–6-minute mark and so the story is very simply drawn, the filming black and white.

childbirth

The other I want to mention is entitled White Song and was directed by Katrina Irawati Graham and tells the story of Raesita (Alana Golingi) and her heartbreak when her love, Andrew (Luke Wright), dies. The story is told by the Kuntil Anak (Derty Eka Putria) who is drawn to her sorrow. The credits to the film contain a note that “Also known as the Pontianak, the Kuntil Anak is the traditional Indonesian ghost of a woman who dies in childbirth.” Sometimes the kuntilanak is depicted as vampiric of course.

giving comfort

In this not so much. She does tell us her story, of her being married and her husband (I Gusti Made Oka Wibawa) being physically abusive and subjecting her to marital rape. Of the difficult birth that kills her and a child born in anger. However, her interaction with Raesita is one of comfort and love – though her idea of comfort is to make the pregnant Raesita become as she is… This was interesting and a nice take on the myth.

standing above victim

The other shorts were of a varying quality, though the collection altogether is worth looking at. However, mark the caution that it is more thriller (perhaps chiller) than horror. In the case of anthologies, I score for the vampire segment(s) – in this we only have the one – White Song being more of a genre interest as there is no vampiric activity. Grillz is cute enough but is really short and very simplistic – 5.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US  

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Short Film: Vampire {2014}

With the description as an ‘Indonesia Comedy Short Film’, this is just over 12-minutes in length and was released in 2014. It was directed by Fitro Dizianto and whether it is actually a comedy is debatable – there is banter between the two main characters but little in comedic strokes, as it were.

Cap and Pli

It begins with Pli (Aryudha Fasha) watching a horror movie with headphones on. His friend Cap (Eka Wahyu Primadani) sneaks up behind him and grabs his sides making him jump. Cap is hungry but it is late at night and the only place open is the Cak Iwan food hall. Pli isn’t too sure as the place is by the graveyard and, as he points out, it is Friday night (which I assume is a cultural/religious observation). He suggests that the foodhall (which is literally a street vendor under canvas) has a Toyol – the subs explaining that it is a ghost that brings wealth.

heading for food

Pli has a motorbike but suggests he is low on petrol. Cap insists that they use it and it conks out in front of the graveyard. There is movement through the graves and talk of kuntilanak and the Sundel Bolong (which is Javanese ghost similar to the kuntilanak). Suzanna is mentioned, which I assume was a reference to Indonesian horror movie icon Suzzanna. As they push the bike they see an orb flying over the street – Cap mentions UFOs but Pli suggests it is witchcraft.

other customers

As it is they reach the foodhall safely and order food. When it arrives a man (Rizky Ades) and woman (Senja Karisma) come in. The lads’ banter moves to her being attractive and then Pli jokingly suggesting she might be a vampire – in a hijab, retorts Cap. This leads to discussion about a Muslim version of Twilight and the thought of Bella Swan wearing a hijab. Then the conversation steers to her biting a neck and cap states that he’d put a talisman to her forehead – a reference to the Chinese kyonsi, and (what I assume to be) a disparaging joke about the Javanese and their form of vampire apotropaic.

fangs

What I will have to do, however, is spoil the ending. The lads simply leave but then the foodhall cook (Mirza) turns to see the fanged woman feeding off her companion. It cuts to silhouette through the canvas and we see her long tongue shoot out and take the man’s head off. It is quite an amusing piece because the two lads seem to be having genuine fun. We get a broad swath of Indonesian lore mentioned as well as touching on some Chinese and Javanese things and, of course, we see the pervasiveness of the Twilight franchise.

At the time of posting there is no IMDb page.

Vamp or Not? Kuntilanak (2018)

This 2018 film, directed by Rizal Mantovani and hailing from Indonesia, suffers from not quite knowing what it wants to be. It has a horror theme but the young cast pushes it down a kid’s arena to a degree. That said it has some effective scare moments but what we are interested in more than anything is whether it is Vamp or Not?

So we have looked at several movies with kuntilanaks as the primary monster. Sometimes the vampire correlation is obvious, at other times not so much. In this case the kuntilanak of the story seems to be much more of a spectre but is it a vampiric ghost? We shall see.

According to Bane’s Encyclopedia of Vampires a kuntilanak is a variant of the pontianak, suggesting that “In the folklore of Indonesia and Malaya there is a vampiric demon known as a pontianak. When a woman dies in childbirth, as a virgin, or as the victim of a pontianak attack, she will then transform into this type of vampire”. We do not know how this kuntilanak became what she is (ie whether she died in childbirth) but she is a child stealer who seeks to replace her lost child.

anger in art

It starts in a house and Anjas plays with a remote-control car. He hears his name being whispered and calls out for his mother. He wanders into a room where a large mirror is covered by a dust sheet but then his dad calls him. His dad reminds him that his mother is dead and it is clear the boy blames himself – she had gone to buy him the car and had an accident. The father tells him not to blame himself but gets angry with him when he wants to stay up rather than go to bed. In his room he angrily draws his mother as the mirror begins to move.

trail of blood

He investigates and the mirror has written on it “when she comes you will be gone”. Suddenly a female figure is sat there but then he realises it is his mother (the kuntilanak has taken her form). She holds him and asks whether he wants to go with her and he answers in the affirmative – at which she changes into a monstrous form and he seems to be physically affected by the transformation; it is difficult to tell but she might be indulging in energy vampirism. The father investigates his scream and finds a trail of blood leading to the mirror.

mirror

Our main characters are a group of adopted kids. The lady who has adopted them is going away for three weeks and the eldest (by quite a way, being a teen, the rest being pre-teen), Lydia (Aurélie Moeremans), is being left in charge. She has arranged for her boyfriend, Glenn (Fero Walandouw), to get her a new mirror. Glenn is host on a paranormal investigation show and has looked at the “kuntilanak house” and takes the mirror – bringing the cursed mirror to the house with the kids.

nail in the head

Primary lore is offered by Miko – the bookwormish kid. We get the idea that the kuntilanak either lives in the forest or the mirror. They can be summoned but are attracted to children – especially those missing their mother. We discover that the children can be rescued but they are often deposited in strange places (atop trees, in henhouses). This doesn’t overly fit in with Anjas who we meet again as a spirit as he has been killed, nor does it fit with the look of being drained and the blood left at his abduction. He shows the kids, through a picture, how the kuntilanak can be defeated – with an iron nail. This is not in the neck (as per the pontianak’s folklore) or permanently in the head as a power limiter as in Paku Kuntilanak. Rather she is literally staked in the head in a stabbing motion.

Aurélie Moeremans as Lydia

Her primary activity is very much a haunting more than anything else. But she is able to become corporeal and interact with the living in such a way. She is also able to possess the living (and possesses Lydia). That is about all around the lore, however. There is precious little vampiric – unless one believes she was draining Anjas (and as mentioned that isn’t conclusive). If that is the case this is then Vamp, if not it is still of genre interest.

The imdb page is here.

Pocong kesetanan! – review

Director: Pinkan Utari

Release date: 2011

Contains spoilers

We have come across the Indonesian pocong, or shroud ghost, before. From Muslim lore the pocong shroud must have its ties released after 40 days following the death. If that does not happen then the soul becomes trapped in the body and hops out of the grave.

It isn’t a vampire type, it is more like a physical ghost. This film lands on our radar because there is a creature mash up and the film also includes a kyonsi. Now a Chinese hopping vampire and pocong mash up sounded brilliant to me, on paper at least. With both creatures portrayed as hopping it just seemed to work in my head. I wish it had worked on screen.

Santo

It begins with a character, Santo (and, no, he’s nothing like the wrestler), sneaking through what appeared to be a derelict building. I say appeared to be, because we later discover it is some sort of mausoleum. As he sneaks through we see a pocong and a kyonsi hopping. Santo gets to a coffin and opens it… and wakes up at home with the pocong floating above him, before it vanishes.

uninvited guests

Santo goes to his front door and we get three young people there; Bujang, Mertil and James. They have been sent from the village where Santo originally comes from, by his father and a teacher, to bring him home. His friend Asep later turns up as he is in a relationship with Mertil. Santo house-shares with two girls as well. He convinces Bujang and James to go to an old cemetery with him, due to the dream he has had.

the kuntilanak

He explains that a Chinese man was buried in the cemetery and his coffin has treasure in it. The absolutely wafer thin plot is that they take the monies from the coffin and are haunted by the kyonsi, the pocong (who had died trying to get the treasure) and it seems a kuntilanak might be around too. However the monsters do little but scare the cast – there are no attacks as such, indeed no vampiric behaviour at all, and little in the way of plot.

kyonsi

The film is a comedy. Bujang is a rhyming champion (I assume he was meant to be a rapper, maybe it was a poet) and offers rhymes with an affected grin at the end, which is meant to be funny. Of course the subtitles did the rhyming no justice at all, but the couplets weren’t funny either. I think, perhaps, there was a high level of missed cultural references but – even taking that into account – it wasn’t funny. The fact that the DVD’s English subs were obviously poor probably didn’t help.

holding breath

Gags about girls’ armpit hair, for instance, were at best puerile, rather misogynistic and mainly pointless – perhaps the Indonesian humour around this is culturally ingrained but it left me cold. We got a holding breath and fart gag – a 'go to' for comedies with kyonsi in – and quite a bit of physical humour around the hauntings. But all through I was just left colder and colder by the humour and left grasping for a plot that was gossamer thin.

Perhaps my Western sensibilities are doing this one a injustice – I hope so – but for me this was poor. 2 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Kuntilanak 3 – review

Director: Rizal Mantovani

Release date: 2008

Contains spoilers

This is the third film in Mantovani’s Kuntilanak series – preceded by Kuntilanak and Kuntilanak 2 – and again stars Julie Estelle (Rumah Dara) as Sam, a girl with the power to sing a chant (though it is revealed in this that it is a Javanese lullaby) that summons the kuntilanak.

I nearly made this an honourable mention as there is very little vampire like action by the kuntilanak in this. However, towards the end we get a vampire-variant activity. I won’t spoil the ending sa such but will look at the lore later.

the kuntilanak

We start, however, with a couple in the jungle camping. Stella (Laudya Cynthia Bella) and her fella are engaged and she tries to scare him with tales of the kuntilanak and pretending to stop breathing. He goes into the jungle to get firewood. She hears singing and goes looking for him – finding him with his eyes poked out and held by the kuntilanak. She runs but it hunts her down.

Julie Estelle as Sam

A jeep carries Asti (Imelda Therinne), Herman (Reza Pahlevi), Petra (Laura Antoinette) and Darwin (Mandala Abdi Shoji) into the jungle, a helicopter buzzes overhead and they are acting as a rescue team for their friends (the couple from the intro) who are lost and incommunicado whilst on a hike. The chopper peels off and they pass by a woman walking the road. They return to her – it is Sam – and insist on offering her a lift.

kuntilanak in night vision

When they get as far as the jeep can go and have to continue on foot, Sam starts hearing a voice whispering her name. That night, whilst camped, they hear a baby crying and go to investigate – though they find nothing we see the kuntilanak stalking them. Sam has a dream of her mother telling her to find grandmother at Ujung Sedo to end the curse of chanting – a dream that adds some backstory for those who haven’t seen the first two films.

its behind you

The thing is this kind of turns into a slasher/stalker flick with a monster and a large dash of the supernatural. Sam does not use the chant in this and the kuntilanak acts more like a trickster at first – creeping behind folks and undoing hammock knots – and then starts to take the friends out one by one. A strange mist that dulls hearing as well as sight marks the barrier to Ujung Sedo and signifies the passage into another world.

child gnawing on an arm

It is at the end that the film decides to make its point, having wasted about an hour or more on this supernatural slasher side story. Sam finds children in the jungle and round an abandoned village, including the character Yenny (Cindy Valerie) from the second film. This also ties in with the children being taken through the kuntilanak mirror at the head of the second film.

grandmother

When Sam meets ‘grandmother’, an ancient witch, actual lore is offered. The kuntilanak is the soul of a woman who gave birth (to an evil child) and was murdered after the child was born. In a strange moment of logic she lives forever as a foetus carried by grandmother (keeping her forever alive) but can be summoned in full form by a chanter. The vampiric element is that the children have been collected as they were conceived in sin and the kuntilanak eats their souls to stay alive.

unexplained dying effect

The film was interesting towards the end, due to the very unusual elements of lore, but dragged through the beginning. The friends were dead meat walking and we knew it and Sam had very little of substance to do – and seemed to be in no danger herself (as she was wanted in the village). One of the friends seems to go a funny, cracked shade and has red eyes when she died, why was not explained.

I felt this to be a bit of a damp squib within the series. Most of the acting was at a simple slasher level and Julie Estelle seemed to revert to looking bewildered through the majority of the film – coming alive again in the last fifteen minutes or so. 3.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Kuntilanak 2 – review

Director: Rizal Mantovani

Release date: 2007

Contains spoilers

In many respects Kuntilanak 2 starts exactly where Kuntilanak leaves off… ish… sort of…

That is, it does after the credits. Before the credits we get a scene of three children breaking into the, now abandoned, Mangkujiwo Boarding House to play. There is a brother and sister and an older kid and the house has been invaded by vegetation making it an ideally eerie place to play in. The brother counts on the stairs as the sister hides on the ground floor and the older kid hides on the second floor (if you recall that’s the really bad one).

kids in the mansion

Well all the floors are bad, to be fair, and one by one the kids are scared by a variety of kuntilanak – I am convinced there is more than one there. The main one has a very broad mouth reminiscent of the creature from Death Note, but that’s beside the point. The brother and sister both confront kuntilanak and then go to the older kid – their eyes now weirdly staring and fixed rictus grins adorning their faces. They walk him to one of the broken mirrors and say that this is where they live now. Suddenly the mirror is fixed and they are inside it.

Julie Estelle as Sam

Sam (Julie Estelle) is in a taxi and the driver very casually suggests that he will rob her. He stops the car and she hands him her purse and gets out of the cab. He follows her as it isn’t enough, rape seems to be on the cards when she turns to him and sings the chant. He runs and gets in his car, his nose bleeding. The kuntilanak beheads him with the cab’s window.

The Kuntilanak

Meanwhile a business man has visited the Mangkujiwo, the satanic cult, and whatever he has asked them to do has failed. The head Mangkujiwo admits it is the case and the man demands his money back. For his trouble he is injured and taken out to a pit where he is brained and tossed in with other bodies. The Mangkujiwo discuss how their last Kuntilanak singer got herself killed by the new girl and that Yanti (Lita Soewardi), the boarding house manager, is missing. They determine to find the new girl.

Eva Sanders as Gung

Sam reaches her destination, a shop with a room to rent from the family who run it. The little girl, Yenny (Cindy Valerie) knows that there is something wrong, evil even, with Sam. Gung (Evan Sanders) is dreaming and, in his dream, he is back with the kuntilanak being tortured and fed upon. He awakens with a start and reaches for medication. I said in respect of the first film that Sanders’ acting was filled with histrionics. In this his character has suffered a break down and the acting style works really well. His friend Iwang (Ibnu Jamil) suggests that he must find Sam and return back to where the trauma began (the boarding house).



chanting down the phone

Sam meanwhile is having a crisis of personality. She knows that Iwang has suggested Gung find her and sings the chant down the phone to him (she also appears to have developed a psychic dialling system for the phone). She seems comfortable with the maggot puking that follows a chant. The chant causes Iwang to be killed in the manner of a kitchen accident. She then dreams of all her victims in hell begging her for forgiveness.

Sam faces herslef

Madame Mangkujiwo (Alice Iskak) appears before her as a ghost talking of regret and Sam looks at herself in the mirror (which is the Kuntilanak mirror that she has had delivered to her new lodgings) and her reflection moves differently. It becomes manifest in the room and she fights with herself. The good Sam wins against the evil Sam but she knows how good the evil feels and how at peace she would be if she let herself surrender to it. Yes we have a whole Jedi type dark and light battle going on and, actually, it is probably better handled than the (new) Star Wars films!

The Kuntilanak feeds

The film rumbles along at a fairly even pace and has a twist to get us to the finale that you can see a mile off. That said there is a twist cliff-hanger, at the very end, that is designed to go into part three of the series that worked better. Estelle is still rather pleasant to look at and she betrays more emotion in this part than the simple bewilderment she previously protrayed.

Sam chanting

The photography wasn’t as nice this time around and the kuntilanaks seemed falser, more like caricatures so the atmosphere wasn’t quite as good. There are some logic flaws, the main one being that because the mirrors were broken (by Sam in film 1) the kuntilanaks were free and looking for revenge on the chanter who controls them. Yet one of the mirrors was intact (and with Sam) and the kuntilanak still heeded her chants. That aside 5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.