Film Review : Buy Bust by Erik Matti (A Filipino Action Film Worthy of Your Time and Money)

Running Time : 127 minutes
Director : Erik Matti
Producer/s : Reality Films/ Viva Films

WARNING: This Film Review Contains SPOILERS!!!!!

Let us admit it the Philippines is not known for making good action movies, in fact the last action movie I personally appreciated was the Historical film ,Heneral Luna, that screened in 2015. Aside from nailing every romantic movie the Philippines have ever created Pinoy action movies with Hollywood Caliber is rare these days so we really need to appreciate each one and be proud of it.

Honestly I am still lost for words even if I just watched the movie yesterday at night time, I still can't believe that Buy Bust was that good, it made me think twice and used Google for assurance that what I watched was made by a Filipino Director. For the Director, Erik Matti, I don't have doubts with his latest creation because I have watched all of his recent films including On-The-Job which is also knows as OTJ which is also a top level action movie created by Matti which was on screen in 2013.

The director is also controversial as he is known for tackling real problems in our society from the politics and even religion he is showing us in the big screen the hidden truth a lot of people don't know it even is existing. For the movies involving issues with the religion I remembered Matti tackled it in his Films Honor thy Father and Seklusyon. Now one of my Pro Tip is when you see a Film Directed by Matti you now know it is a must watch.

The film aside from two people, Anne Curtis and Brandon Vera, is created by a not so known cast of actors but it didn't made the film less good. All of the actors and actresses done all their role pretty well. The storyline is not even messed up it was pretty clear, the movie is centered at as what the movie title suggest a Buy Bust operation in order to get the Drug Lord, Biggie Chen, which the Philippine Government is hunting for a long time. Along the way you will see a lot of twist and turns that will mess up the entire planned operation.

All through out the film you will have some of your own realizations if this things, like an inside man in the police force is taking up bribes and intently killing off his/her own squad members is true and is really happening in our society today. Aside from realizations you will see some truth we are not hiding as we always see it, and that is the squatters area, the Buy Bust operation took place in a squatters' area or the slum as what others have call it, you will see a lot of informal settlers struggling between the fight of the drug dealers and the agents of PDEA (Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency). You can see their struggles in the night time news reports about innocent bystanders being caught by their crossfires.

The cinematography of the film is extraordinary on Philippine Standards, believe it or not their was a fight scene that almost lasted for 3 minutes without changing the camera angle, which means the whole shot (fight scene) was taken straight without any cuts or adjustments this means that the actors and actresses have mastered their moves in order to take this kind of take. This is really unbelievable for me as the fight scene took place on top of a house and ended up on a graveyard. Unlike what we are used to on single scenario shot camera scenes this was a totally new experience for us, Matti really delivered good with the film.

Another thing that caught up with my mind is how the media deliver us with a wrong information, as a news reporter said in the movie that there where only 13 casualties overall but a drone shot showed us that their were more than 13 who were killed during that fight. The movie timed the action happening from 8:00 PM and ended up at 4:44 AM and all through out that timeline a lot of deaths and action has happened.

This was not purely a serious movie Brandon Vera being a MMA fighter gave us a few laughs with the realistic fight scenes as he definitely showed how powerful he was as the enemies who even have knives don't have a match for him. Also simply hearing some Filipino bad words put into good timing will definitely make the crowd giggle and also laugh.

Overall the movie is a must watch and if you are having second thoughts about this don't be as it scored 100% in rotten tomatoes which currently has 6 critiques who scored that number. You will see a lot of praises from this movie from both the watchers and the actors itself as this film was actually took more than 1 year to produce as it got pulled out of the Metro Manila Film Festival last 2017 which was a big set back as it would definitely will have a lot of viewers if it was a part of it.

RECO: Definitely a must watch. This film was also shown internationally before it even aired in the Philippines. The Film participated in New York Asian Film Festival last June 29, 2018.

Sources of the Photos
Poster
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