Review of The Night Comes For Us (2018) by Thequietgamer — 05 Jan 2019

My expectations were a little too high for this Netflix original after hearing so many calling it the streaming service's The Raid, and that hurt my enjoyment of it a bit. It's not an unfair comparison by any means. Both are relentless, high-octane martial arts movies that will shock and enthrall you with the savageness of each bloody brawl. You just shouldn't come into this expecting the same level of quality as the two Gareth Evans masterpieces. The choreography simply isn't as good in the more crowded throwdowns and there are regular moments of absurdity that can pull you out of the experience.

Enemies seem to wait in line for their butt kickings. Our heroes will walk into a room of thugs only to be attacked one at a time while the other foes stand idly by and watch their buddies get taken out in sometimes hilariously brutal fashion. It makes you aware of how staged everything is and that's the exact opposite of what you want from an action movie. The more intimate encounters make up for this though as the best beatdowns are the ones with only two or three people onscreen at a time. These moments can feel so desperate and real that you may have a hard time believing you aren't actually watching the actors fight to the death. Sometimes less really is more.

The movie is in love with its gore. Seriously, this has more scattered entrails and blood splatter than any torture porn horror flick I've seen. Bones snap in a way that will make you wince and sometimes you can feel every blow. The incredibly gruesome nature of the violence is one of the films greatest strengths, but can also be a bit goofy. The way people gargle as blood sprays everywhere whenever a throat is slit is actually kind of comical. Partially due to how often it happens. You'll also see a lot bodies awkwardly flail about as they are riddled with absurd amounts of machine gun fire in the most cliché of gangster movie tropes.

The plot comes off as confusing and convoluted when all it really needed to do was stick to the simple setup of protect the girl, get redemption. There is a little bit of emotion though and the world is worthy of further exploration John Wick style. There are so many Triad assassin's running around with cool titles it's like an anime in the best of ways.

The Night Comes for Us is a flawed, yet satisfactory martial arts gangster flick that plays out like a sloppier and bloodier version of The Raid. It even recycles two that movie's stars. Joe Taslim really deserves more starring roles after this and Iko Uwais once again delivers another career highlight display of skill in the final fight. There's a lot to like here. All I'm trying to say is don't go in expecting The Raid 3 like I did and you'll have a much better time.