Director: Timo Tjahjanto
Writer: Timo Tjahjanto
Stars: Aurora Ribero, Hana Malasan, Taskya Namya
Synopsis: Codename 13, a 17-year-old assassin, is suspended due to a sloppy mission in Japan. She meets 11-year-old Monji, who loses his mother, and sets out to rescue him.
Action is back with a bloody vengeance. Fans of non-stop brawls, gunfights and chases have certainly been spoiled in recent years. Between the John Wick franchise and an occasional burst of excitement out of nowhere with films like Nobody or Monkey Man, one gets the sense that there are still people fighting to give us quality action. But of course, there’s the unfortunate reality that most major films being marketed as blockbuster action flicks simply don’t have the juice. Now, I have no intention of naming names of any kind. But it does feel essential to point out that, for the most part, general action fare feels like a barren wasteland. Lucky for us, Indonesian filmmaker Timo Tjahjanto saw the desperate plea for help as a call to action. And with his latest film, The Shadow Strays, celebrating its world premiere at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival, it feels like he is taking on a challenge. It’s been 6 years since his last full-blown action bonanza, The Night Comes For Us. And it appears as if he saw the last half decade of action filmmaking and decided to overload the senses as a reminder of how good we can still have it. We shouldn’t settle for filmmakers cutting around action when there are those who do all they can to avoid cutting altogether! Even more, this film serves as a reminder that action films don’t need to settle for hollow scripts. Too often do people try and reduce genre fare to being less than. What’s most exciting about The Shadow Strays is that, even putting action aside, there’s plenty to latch onto that makes for an enriching and exciting experience.
Over the course of the film, its title kept popping into my head. I began thinking about what people think of when they think of the word ‘shadow.’ There’s the most likely answer: it’s what happens when light shines against something. There’s the more fantastical answer: a sort of darkness that looms over light and goodness. And then, there’s the metaphorical answer: something that follows us around, regardless of whether or not we want it to. Everything, by that logic, has a shadow attached to it. And that’s most certainly true for basically all the principal characters of The Shadow Strays. And aside from just being a flat-out badass title to have, one begins to question what it really means. As Tjahjanto introduces us to more of the characters, the crux of this film, and the beauty of its title, begins to take shape.
It’s in the extravagant opening sequence that we meet Agent 13 (Aurora Ribero). It feels more apt to say we just witness her awesome capabilities. Covered in head-to-toe armor and weaponry, she is part of an elite group of cold-blooded assassins known only as the Shadow. And from this stellar introduction, she certainly lives up to the namesake and fright bestowed upon her by a random henchman explaining why his boss (and their entire organization) needs to be worried. Following the brutal mayhem that ensues, one thing leads to another before Agent Umbra (Hana Malasan) has to come in and clean up the rest of the mess made. Because of this, 13 is sent to Jakarta to await further instructions while Umbra, her instructor, goes on another mission. While this is very much a film about Agent 13 and her eventual quest for vengeance, Tjahjanto certainly loves his stories revolving around parallel journeys clashing into one another in brutal fashion. In what feels like one of the few missteps of The Shadow Strays, we are occasionally pulled away to see what Umbra is dealing with internally.
These sequences feel a bit more like cutaways expanding the world of the film rather than actual parallel narratives. To be clear, these scenes following Umbra serve a definite purpose. And they look damn great from an action filmmaking perspective. But I would argue that these scenes invariably convey the same message as the rest of the film follows 13’s journey, but to a slightly lesser effect. Now, it’s also important to note that despite feeling this way, the climax of The Shadow Strays still strikes you like a cannonball. At no point during this film will you feel bored. It is a non-stop assault on the senses, with Tjahjanto setting up his fights everywhere from a small kitchen to an empty warehouse, or from a nightclub to the innards of a cargo plane. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. It cannot be overstated how cleverly his fights are structured. Beyond relying on exciting camera movement and blood-splatter galore, the wide array of Chekhov’s “insert common item to later be used as a deadly weapon here” commands the audience to remain rapt at attention with each scene. If Tjahjanto shows his fighters as individuals who are willing and able to use anything around them as part of their arsenal, it instantly conditions his audience to keep an eye out for anything and everything.
So, as the film comes barreling to a close, we once again return to the idea of a shadow. What happens when something we thought would be attached to us forever strays away? When a child sees the body of his mother taken away in a bag by police? When a student is no longer able to abide by the immoral pledges her master forced her to take? When a son, who has long been under the thumb of his domineering father, decides to take matters into his own hands, and set off a catastrophic chain of events? In many ways, The Shadow Strays feels like a film about parenthood and the eventual need to relinquish control. When the shadow strays from what it’s connected to, fate will take over. We must eventually let it stray if that’s what’s called for. To hold onto it with all our might clearly causes a much larger set of issues. It’s not easy to let go; but it does feel necessary at times. To let go of something can often make us stronger than we ever thought possible. And make no mistake, there will be few characters in cinema this year that will be stronger (not just physically, but mentally and emotionally) as the all-time legend, Agent 13.
The Shadow Strays celebrated its world premiere at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. For more information on the film, head right here.
