Joko Anwar

Anwar was born in Medan, North Sumatera where he grew up watching kung fu movies and horror films.[2] He had also written and directed plays as a student. He went to the prestigious Bandung Institute of Technology to study Aerospace Engineering because his family could not afford to send him to a film school. After graduating in 1999, he became a journalist at The Jakarta Post and later a film critic.

During an interview with Nia Dinata for The Jakarta Post, the film producer was impressed and asked him to write for her new project which was later titled Arisan! (2003).[2] The film earned commercial and critical success and won numerous awards including "Best Film" at the 2005 Indonesian Film Festival and "Best Movie" at the 2004 MTV Indonesia Movie Awards. He went on to direct a feature film, the romantic comedy Janji Joni (Joni's Promise) (2005), which he wrote when he was in college in 1998. This feature directorial debut was the #1 box office hit in Indonesia that year and won "Best Movie" at the 2005 MTV Indonesia Movie Awards. SET Foundation which is chaired by renowned Indonesian filmmaker Garin Nugroho gave him a special award for innovative storytelling in a movie. Janji Joni (Joni's Promise) was selected in several prestigious international film festivals including by Sydney Film Festival and Pusan International Film Festival. The film revived the career of Barry Prima, an international cult martial-art actor, who is Anwar's childhood hero.[2]

In 2007, Joko Anwar wrote and directed Kala, Indonesia's first tribute to film noir which won rave reviews from critics. Sight & Sound picked the film as one of the year's best and also named Anwar as one of the smartest filmmakers in Asia.[3] The film was screened in numerous film festivals and won a Jury Prize at the New York Asian Film Festival.[4] The Hollywood Reporter wrote the film as "a sophisticated noir whodunit in homage to Fritz Lang's M".[5]

In additions to films that Anwar directed himself, he has also written several screenplays for other directors, including a sex comedy Quickie Express which won Best Film of 2008 at the Jakarta International Film Festival and a cat-and-mouse thriller Jakarta Undercover. Both movies are box-office success. He also wrote Fiksi which won several awards in Indonesia including Best Film and Best Screenplay at the Indonesian Film Festival.

Anwar's next film, The Forbidden Door, was released in 2009 which is a psychological thriller which has also received rave reviews from critics. Richard Corliss of Time wrote that "As slick as it is sick, the movie could be Anwar's calling card for international employment, if only Hollywood moguls wanted something out of their own narrow range". He also mentioned the film as an "example of what movies could be but rarely dare to try".[6] Maggie Lee of The Hollywood Reporter wrote that Anwar's film "would make Hitchcock and Almodóvar proud", and mentioned that "Joko Anwar accessorizes his creepy suspense-horror with a dazzling array of auteur-homage".[7] The film has been screened in several film festivals including in The Times BFI London Film Festival and International Film Festival Rotterdam.

Modus Anomali is Anwar's fourth film and it premiered at South by Southwest where it received generally positive reviews including from Richard Kuipers of Variety who called it "A brainteaser" and "this extreme arthouse entry will leave a lasting impression on many auds".[8] It received international distributions in several countries including theatrical release in France. For North America release, the movie was retitled Ritual.

In 2014, Anwar made his fifth feature A Copy of My Mind which won rave reviews from critics and premiered at Venice Film Festival. The movie which was shot in 8 days mixed romance with current political situation in Indonesia at that time.[9]

Satan's Slaves is Joko Anwar's sixth movie and was both a critical and commercial success. It became the highest-grossing horror film of all time in Indonesia and was distributed in many territories. It won seven Citra Awards in Indonesia, and Best Film at Overlook Film Festival.[10] Richard Kuipers of Variety wrote "suspenseful and emotionally engaging exercise that also benefits from well-timed shots of deadpan humor along the way."[11]

Anwar then wrote and directed Gundala in 2017 which was set to launch a cinematic universe based on Indonesia's vast comic book characters.[12] The movie premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. Victor Stiff of That Shelf wrote "From beginning to end, Gundala delivers fast and furious action and rarely stops to take its foot off the gas."[13]

Anwar's eighth film, Perempuan Tanah Jahanam (known in English as Impetigore), also became a critical and commercial success.[14] It premiered at Sundance Film Festival where it received generally positive reviews. Josh Hurtado of Screen Anarchy wrote "Joko Anwar continues to carve out a niche for himself as one of the world's leading genre auteurs, going from strength to strength, he's got an incredibly impressive body of work already, and seems to only get better as he becomes more ambitious. Impetigore is a film that will certainly resonate with genre fest audiences, and hopefully the success of Satan's Slaves and Impetigore will bring new converts to worship at the altar of Anwar."[15]