Satan's Slaves


Satan's Slaves is a 2017 Indonesian horror film written and directed by Joko Anwar. It is a loose remake-prequel to the 1980 film of the same name directed by Sisworo Gautama Putra. The plot follows a now-poor and hapless family haunted by the death of their mother who dies after being bedridden for three years from a strange and debilitating illness.
As of November 7, 2017, the movie has been watched by 4.2 million moviegoers, making Pengabdi Setan the highest-grossing domestic Indonesian film of 2017. The movie was released in a total of 42 countries including Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, Germany, and the United States.

Plot

Set in 1981, Rini lives in the outskirts of Jakarta in a large house with her mother, Mawarni Suwono; her wheelchair-bound grandmother, Rahma Saidah; her father, Bahri; and her three younger brothers; Tony, Bondi, and Ian, who is mute. The family live amid financial hardship as her mother Mawarni is ill and bedridden and royalties from her former singing career have long dried up. Her mother uses a bell to signal for assistance as she is unable to yell or walk.
Late one night, Rini sees her mother standing by the window. Shocked, she approaches her, and her mother collapses. Bahri solemnly declares her mother dead. The family is acquainted with the Ustad, who does Mawarni's funeral, and his son Hendra. The next day, Bahri leaves for the city to settle a financial dispute. The brothers experience paranormal activities and witness apparitions resembling their mother.
One day, Hendra reveals to Rini that he saw a figure resembling Mawarni at her window. He informs her that it's something else that has assumed her form and is not actually her mother. Meanwhile, the grandmother is penning a letter in her room, but is later shown in another room, looking distressed as she stands from her wheelchair. Rini and Bondi are shocked to discover their grandmother's corpse inside the well. After her funeral, Rini discovers her grandmother's letter, addressed to Budiman Syailendra. She visits the address with Hendra. Budiman informs her that he is her grandmother's childhood friend and reveals that her grandmother did not originally approve of his father's marriage to Mawarni. Artists were not seen as respectable prospects, and she was thought to be infertile before giving birth to Rini and her siblings. Budiman hands Rini a booklet with information he wrote that would help explain her situation.
Tony, reading Budiman's article on Satan's slaves, pieces together information from his childhood memory of accompanying his mother at events and coming across individuals who rarely spoke with other guests, inferring they were watching over their mother. He tells Rini that their mother may have been connected to this Satanic sect, who allow barren women to bear children through the worship of Satan but with the condition that the last child be handed over to the cult at the age of seven. The Ustad advises they pray to Allah regularly. That night, while Rini practices Salah, she is haunted by the ghostly figure and they all run to the Ustad's house for refuge.
The next day, Tony reveals to Rini that based on the article, their mother wasn't impregnated by her husband but by members of the cult. Hendra dies in an accident with a truck. His body is taken to the Ustad's home and Rini finds the letter from Budiman he was coming back with. Her father returns and the family becomes victim to the worst poltergeist experience so far, the house surrounded by figures from the Satanic cult. The poltergeist attempts to drag Ian out but he is saved by Bondi.
The next day they wait for a truck to move out of the house, a day before Ian's 7th birthday. The truck fails to arrive. As darkness falls, they experience a blackout. As they go to sleep, with the Ustad staying over for protection, Rini wakes Tony up after reading the letter, which states the last child isn't actually a sacrifice but an offspring of Satan. Their father wakes up to see Mawarni's corpse next to him in bed, while Bondi sees Ian speaking unintelligibly in a trance. They witness the Ustad being killed by the undead and see Ian go to his mother's undead corpse in the backyard, with dozens more behind them. Tony drags him inside and the spirit of their grandmother slows down the undead by holding back the door; Budiman arrives to rescue the family who run into his van.
A year later, the family have settled in an flats and are visited by a neighbor who gives them food. The neighbor returns to her apartment and talks to Batara, and it's revealed that she is Darminah, the antagonist of the original film.

Cast

Getting trust to produce a remake of old horror film Pengabdi Setan is not easy for director Joko Anwar. Since directing the movie Janji Joni about 10 years ago, Joko has dreamed to do a remake of 1980s horror movie. Joko reveals, Pengabdi Setan is an original film that moves Joko to become a filmmaker. After the struggle, persuasion until finally proving the seriousness to remaking the film, Joko managed to get the attention of Rapi Films producer, Sunil Samtani. Coincidentally, Rapi Films is going to remake the movie, although the production house actually already has a director candidate. Luckily, Joko's idea seems more appealing to Sunil. However, after successfully confirmed as a new film director of Pengabdi Setan, Joko's struggle has been not over yet. He still needs to direct the legendary film to be better than the previous one.
One of Joko's hard struggles is the search for a filming location that is considered to represent the visualization of the story. He confesses that it is quite difficult during the production period. Before finding the right location in Pangalengan, Pengabdi Setan production team takes four months to search. It starts from search in Jakarta area. While searching in the area of Puncak Bogor, West Java, Joko said his team get a good location and interesting. But constraint permission from the owner and after the retracing there is not considered suitable, they began to look elsewhere. Location search was expanded, until finally found an old house in Pangalengan area which located far enough from the initial location desired.
Sunil said that Pengabdi Setan from the idea of story, script, to directing by Joko Anwar requires more budget than horror movie he usually did because they determined to keep the feel of 1980s era as in the original film. He explained that the production team even redesigned an ancient house in Pangalengan, West Java, to become the location for making Pengabdi Setan. This is done in order to 'satisfy' the nuances that the director wants. Though not explaining the nominally straightforwardness required to revive the 'spirit' in Pengabdi Setan, Sunil ensured the budget exceeded Rp2 billion.

Soundtrack

The Pengabdi Setan film soundtrack is directed by Aghi Narottama, Tony Merle, and Bemby Gusti. Director Joko Anwar said that there are at least five songs that will be on the album plus 16 others so there will be a total of 21 tracks. Three of them were released on October 19, 2017 on Spotify and iTunes.

Release

Pengabdi Setan premiered in Indonesia at the Epicentrum XXI, Kuningan, South Jakarta on September 20, 2017. The film was released in all Indonesian cinemas on September 28, 2017, and in Malaysia and Singapore on November 23, 2017. The film also to be released in 42 countries.

Reception

Box office

As of the end of 2017, Pengabdi Setan grossed Rp155 billion in Indonesia, and RM6 million in neighbouring Malaysia, the latter country giving it its place as the highest grossing Indonesian film of all time beating Ada Apa Dengan Cinta? 2's record collective gross of RM4.6 million in 2016. In Mexico, Pengabdi Setan ranked at 6th place on Mexico Box Office on March 2–4, 2018; grossed $233,763 on its first weekend. As of September 2, 2018, it grossed $147,962 in Colombia. On April 3, 2018, it opened at No. 1 in Hong Kong. Back in its home country in Indonesia, Pengabdi Setan became the best-selling Indonesian film of 2017, and ranked at the fourth place of best-selling Indonesian films of all time.

Critical response

On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a 90% approval rating based on 20 reviews, with an average rating of 6.82/10.
John Lui of The Straits Times gave Pengabdi Setan 3.5 stars out of 5 and wrote that "the scares are carefully timed and spaced between plenty of character-building moments, showing the closeness of the family. These soap opera bits have aged the least well, but there is a low-key feel to these moments of filial piety that is thoroughly modern." Variety's Richard Kuipers wrote that the film has "high marks when it comes to the fundamental horror movie task of sending shivers up the spine and quickening the pulse." James Marsh of the South China Morning Post gave the film 3/5 stars, saying "a slow-burning tale that builds to a chaotic and somewhat muddled conclusion, Satan’s Slaves is bursting with ideas." Jonathan Barkan of Dread Central gave the film 3.5 stars out of 5, writing "without a doubt, Satan's Slaves is certainly creepy. This Indonesian occult horror remake gets it right". Writing for SciFiNow, Anton Bitel gave the film 4 out of 5 stars, saying "Mirrorings, repetitions and doppelgängers are fitting images for a film that is itself a reprise of Sisworo Gautama Putra’s 1980 film of the same name — the very film that inspired Anwar to become a writer/director of genre films."

Accolades

Sequel

In a 9 October 2017 interview with The Jakarta Post, director Anwar revealed that the film was a prequel to the original and that a sequel was planned, with the original film now being the third part in a trilogy. On 18 December 2017, executive producer Sunil Samtani said Rapi Films has been discussing the project plan of the sequel of Pengabdi Setan. The film is planned for release in 2019 and Joko Anwar will still be involved. On 23 March 2018, Samtani revealed that they had not come up with a script yet but filming would commence in 2019. He added that the stars of the existing film had expressed their interest but it's up to Anwar to decide on the actors.