It’s been a long time since I wanted to watch a movie twice.

Now that my daughters are all married and gone, and there’s just me and hubby and son, the estrogen factor is outnumbered by testosterone factors, two to one and that affects the type of movies we choose to watch.

I really wanted to watch The Hunger Games, but that one’s dicey with hubby. He is NOT a science fiction fan! And last week we chose The Grey, which though watchable was a HUGE disappointment for me, and half way through hubby went downstairs to work at his desk…not a good sign.

So this week we watched The Raid Redemption.

With two men in the house, you can’t go wrong with ‘action’. And with the rotten tomatoes rating of 84% I thought I might like it.

Had no idea it was set in Indonesia!

The opening scene has this guy praying.

Praying salat! Yup, Muslim prayer!

Then there’s this tender scene with his pregnant wife and he’s out the door, obviously a member of a SWAT team.

Cynical me sees it as a cheap ploy to establish the stakes, up the ante so to speak, show how much this guy has to lose–and yet it works. So how can you argue?

I’m not going to give anything away. It’s a GOOD movie!

And even though I hate ‘bone-crunching’ martial arts fights, there is SO much more to this movie that it really did surprise me that the gore was not very bothersome.

Maybe it was because the otherness of the cultural background really made it all fresh!

And yet it wasn’t overdone.

These guys were obviously from a completely different world and yet CRIME is CRIME and DRUG ENFORCEMENT has to fight corruption everywhere it seems.

I should warn you, it has subtitles. And sometimes they go by so fast it’s hard to read them in time.

And there was hardly a lull in the action where you could get up and get a drink.

My son got mad at me too when I predicted something and was silly enough to say it out loud. He said I’d ruined the scene, and yet I couldn’t help it.

I tend to do that when I’m actually pretty sure but not positive of what’s going to happen–and honestly MOST of the time I’m positive what’s going to happen. Geez, any writer worth their salt can see how the director is setting things up!

But the fact that I wasn’t positive was also a really good sign!

I think this movie definitely deserved the high rating!

No silly tangential plot lines, good and tight storytelling! Well done!

And honestly, in a weird way it made me proud of being a Muslim. Here was this Muslim SWAT officer. The fact that he was Muslim was part of the scenery. And he was clever. And he was resourceful.

The villain was probably Muslim too but you’re not sure, there’s nothing identifiable about it.

It’s just a good movie.

And it’s kind of what I try to do.

Yeah, my stories are about Muslims, but really, I just try to make them good stories!

And I’ve got a confession to make, when I’m telling my stories what I’m really trying to do is make the audience completely FORGET that I’m dressed any different from them at all, that in fact, I am any different from them at all!

I want the story I’m telling to TRANSCEND our differences!

And you’d be surprised to see how often that really does happen.

Anyway, go out and see The Raid Redemption.

I think you’ll like it!