PRESS
MERAH PUTIH
“TO BECOME FREE, THEY BECAME ONE”
HOLLYWOOD-STYLE WAR DRAMA REMINDS INDONESIA
OF THE UNITY, SACRIFICE AND NATIONALISM OF OUR FOREFATHERS
FILM SEEKS TO HELP EDUCATE THE YOUNG, RENEW THE NATIONAL SPIRIT
AND BOOST INDONESIA’S IMAGE ABROAD
Jakarta, August 3rd – From Blitzmegaplex Grand Indonesia, executive producer Rob Allyn, a New York Times best-selling author and longtime producer, director and media executive born in California, shared the initial idea that led to the making of MERAH PUTIH, the first film in a planned “Merdeka Trilogy” which follows a fictional band of cadets turned revolutionary guerrillas in 1947, during the Indonesia Revolution. The film began in Jakarta five years ago, when Rob asked his close friend and business partner Hashim Djojohadikusumo about two old portraits of youths in uniform on the wall. Hashim explained that they were paintings of his two uncles (the brothers of Sumitro Djojohadikusumo, one of the Founding Fathers of Indonesia and the economic guru who helped win recognition of Indonesia’s independence by the United Nations). The prominent Indonesian businessman told Rob the story of how they had been killed in a massacre of cadets while raiding a Japanese armory during the early stages of the revolution, as the Japanese prepared to hand over control of the former Dutch colony back to the British, as custodians for the Netherlands.
Rob’s response was, “That would make a great Hollywood movie!” Hashim and Rob agreed that the story of brave young Indonesians willing to sacrifice their lives for the independence of Indonesia needed to be retold to the young generation of Indonesia – and to the world outside of Indonesia, where few people know much about Indonesia’s long and bloody struggle for independence. “The revolution for our country’s freedom is a subject near to my family and me, as we lost two uncles, First Lt. R.M. Subianto Djojohadikusumo and Cadet R.M. Sujono Djojohadikusumo, in the battle of Lengkong in 1946, and we grew up in the tradition of our father Sumitro’s fight to free and unite our nation as one of Indonesia’s Founding Fathers,” Hashim said. “So for our company PT Media Desa Indonesia, it is our honor to partner with Margate House and produce the first film of our planned Merdeka Trilogy, a saga of young Indonesian cadets who bond together despite their differences in religion, ethnicity, class and culture to become guerrilla fighters for our freedom.”
Rob added, “We set out to make a true historical saga in the best Hollywood tradition, combining the very best talents of Indonesia’s blossoming film industry with world-class special effects and production values of a classic war drama, so that we can help tell this important and largely unknown story of this war to the world. We hope this film comes at a good time, to remind Indonesians and the world that the people of this country once made great sacrifices for freedom, unity and religious tolerance. Indonesia’s image in the world today would be higher if film audiences abroad knew more about the real culture and national identity of Indonesia -- a place where the major religions are respected, where brave young people fought to win their own freedom from colonial domination, and where the heroes of the 1940’s sacrificed all and overcame deep differences of ethnicity, class and religion to join as one to win their freedom.”
The preparation of the movie started with more than two years of painstaking, in-depth research. The script was then written by son-father team of Conor Allyn, who began reading the memoirs of General Nasution and first-hand accounts written by revolutionary soldiers years ago at the vast Southeast Asian studies collection at Georgetown Univerity in Washington, D.C., and his father Rob, Allyn, a New York Times bestselling author of historical non-fiction and novels of political intrigue (REVOLUTION OF HOPE, Viking Press, 2007; FRONT RUNNER, Crown/Random House, 1990). Executive producer Jeremy Stewart interviewed revolutionary veterans who were still living, while Conor and the production team visited military museums, the national archives and battle sites to gather visual ideas. Rob and Jeremy created the characters and basic premise for the film; Conor researched the historical record, created the story and wrote the first draft of the screenplay; and Rob focused on dialogue, humor and dramatic conflict between the characters to draw out themes regarding courage, leadership, sacrifice and the brotherhood of soldiers who come together to fight for a common cause. The screenplay then went through a series of Indonesian readers, film industry veterans, translators and historical fact-checkers, culminating with the contributions of the actors, who helped refine the formal language of the original Bahasa Indonesia translation into a more casual, spoken vernacular that fit the young soldiers. The film’s writer/producer Conor Allyn said, “It was a daily process on set between me and Pak Yadi, our fantastic script supervisor (Margate House’s Dewi Beck) and the actors to translate the sense of the dialogue into a language that was not fully in use by 1947, but that would make sense in the context of Indonesian audiences today – and some of the very best contributions were made by people like Lukman and Rifnu, Sara and Yadi and the cast, who were not afraid to step up and suggest other words or even different lines, jokes or visual bits if those made more sense for their characters and the context of Indonesia. Without giving away the final moment of the film, I can say also that we rewrote it dramatically on the spot, based on a new direction we had come up with the night before and a radical change that the actors proposed. We handed them the rewrite and Donny and Lukman and the whole band put their heads together and said to Yadi and us, ‘we want to take this even further,’ so we just went with it – and the result was terrific!”
After finishing the script a year ago in August 2008, the creators of the film at Margate House then gathered together a group of Indonesia’s top film industry veterans. With the advice of long-time friend and local film/TV producer Gary Hayes, Rob and Jeremy chose the cinematographer who had performed brilliantly for Margate House on many past projects, veteran Director of Photography Yadi Sugandi, (LASKAR PELANGI, THE PHOTOGRAPH) to direct the movie. “Yadi is a genius of visual expression, and we knew he could bring both a true Indonesian sensibility and a fabulous eye to tell the story we had created in a way that was compelling visually and really right for Indonesia, so that the film would go straight to heart here at home, and also show Indonesia at its very best to the world.” Rob and Jeremy then watched the Indonesian film “GIE” and hired its editor, Sastha Sunu, and composer, Thoersi Argeswara, who recently returned from a trip to China where the Beijing Philharmonic Orchestra AISA performed and recorded his score for MERAH PUTIH. “I am afraid that we have shamelessly raided all the great talents developed by fantastic film-makers like Riri Riza, Mira Lesmana, Garin Nugroho and the other bright lights of Indonesia’s rising film industry,” Rob confessed. “We are great admirers and humbled by their accomplishments; they have been great friends to our production and really have allowed us to stand on the shoulders of their genius. I just hope we can contribute a film that is worthy of the standard they have ”
The producers hired top Indonesian Art Director Iri Supit, who had the best collection of props and period knowledge for historical films, and went on a worldwide search to find some of Hollywood’s best-known experts in action films: The British special effects guru Adam Howarth (SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, BLACKHAWK DOWN, HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE), Action Director, veteran English-born stunt supervisor Rocky McDonald (MISSION IMPOSSIBLE II, THE QUIET AMERICAN), Make-Up and Visual Effects Artist Rob Trenton of London (BATMAN - THE DARK KNIGHT), and Key Armorer John Bowring, an Australian who has handled weapons for films in Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, Japan and throughout the world (THE MATRIX, THE THIN RED LINE, AUSTRALIA, X-MEN ORIGINS:WOLVERINE).
Shot in 35-millimeter film, MERAH PUTIH features an all-star ensemble cast of Indonesia’s most talented young actors: Lukman Sardi as the quiet, devout Muslim Amir (LASKAR PELANGI, QUICKIE EXPRESS, 9 NAGA, GIE), Donny Alamsyah as the hot-headed Christian Tomas (FIKSI, 9 NAGA, GIE), Darius Sinathrya as the cocky, elitist playboy Marius (UNGU VIOLET, D’BIJIS, NAGA BONAR JADI 2, LOVE), Zumi Zola as the priyayi patriot Soerono (KAWIN LARIS), and T. Rifnu Wikana as the Hindu street youth Dayan (KADO HARI JADI, LASKAR PELANGI). The film also stars Astri Nurdin as Amir’s wife Melati and introduces London-and-Hollywood-trained actress Rahayu Saraswati as Soerono’s sister Senja.
Casting began 18 months ago, when Margate House conducted a five-day test shoot on HD in the forests of Depok and the colonial back streets of Kota to consider various leading Indonesian actors for the roles. “We imagined a series of images, wrote some bits of dialogue and storyboarded a series of 37 scenes, but really it was very improvisational, like a bunch of teenagers playing war in the woods with their dad’s video camera,” Rob reminisced. “But Lukman, Donny and Sara just burned through the lens. They are brilliant actors and we knew that they had the right stuff to play larger-than-life action heroes in a classic Hollywood-style war movie.” Casting the rest of the roles took more than a year, until producers finally found Darius, Zumi and Rifnu to round out the band of cadets, plus Astri and Rudy Wowor as Dutch Major Van Gaartner. “Rifnu has these amazingly expressive eyes that just grab the camera and tell you everything his character is going through,” Rob said. “While Darius just walked into the conference room and shook my hand and introduced himself and we thought, ‘OK, well, he’s Marius!’”
Set against a historically authentic backdrop of Indonesia’s struggle for independence in 1947 during the First Dutch Aggression into the heart of republican territory in Central Java, MERAH PUTIH tells the story of a fictional band of freedom fighters who bond together as cadets to survive a massacre during the Dutch Van Mook offensive, fighting on as guerrilla soldiers to become true children of the nation, despite their sharp conflicts and deep differences in social class, ethnicity, geographic origin, religion and personality.
MERAH PUTIH will be released national wide in theatres starting August 13th, 2009 at theatre networks of Cineplex 21 and Blitzmegaplex. The film’s website and trailer can be viewed at www.filmmerahputih.com
Contact publicist:
ipublicist@gmail.com
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Bonnie – 0818 735075
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