Alice Oscura, Featured Writer
Disclaimer: The following contains minor spoilers.
Remember when we reviewed The Third Eye Duology on Day 7 of our 31 Days of horror? Well, for Day 18 I am coming back to you with another film by the same director, Rocky Soraya, titled Indigo (2023). Indigo is another horror out of Indonesia whose premise may seem a bit similar to The Third Eye duology and yet, it isn’t. I’ll explain as we delve further into the film.
The word “indigo” is used several times throughout the film to refer to a person that has their third eye opened since birth. In addition to this, they always have another superior psychic ability like retrocognition (the ability to see into the past) and precognition (the ability to see into the future). Our story begins where a desperate couple calls upon an Indigo named Mrs Sekar (Sara Wijayanto) to help their daughter Zora. Zora has an imaginary friend who happens to be the ghost of a pregnant woman named Widuri (Rina Ritogna). Mrs Sekar informs them that their daughter is also an Indigo and that is why she can see ghosts. However, after Zora is violently attacked by Widuri, Mrs Sekar closes Zora’s third eye and banishes both Widuri and Zora’s memory of the event.
Years later, Zora (Amanda Manopo) is an accomplished artist and engaged to be married to a successful businessman Aksa (Aliando Syarief) who works for her deceased father’s group of companies. Zora has her reservations about the way that her father’s business partners conduct shady business deals and advises Aksa against continuing to work for them. Pay attention to that interaction because that actually turns out to be an integral hint towards the greater premise. Zora also happens to be the sole guardian over her younger sister Ninda (Nicole Rossi) since their parents’ death. Ninda is a very troubled young girl as she sees events before they happen and is currently being terrorised by the ghost of a pregnant woman. Yep, you guessed it. Widuri has returned and is now targeting Zora’s sister who was also born as an Indigo. But, with Zora having no memories of her experience with Widuri, she is skeptical as heck and has her sister on medication in order to treat schizophrenia. As the story progresses, Zora eventually has her third eye reopened in order to protect Ninda from Widuri’s hellish plan, that turns out to be directly tied into Zora and Ninda’s bloodline.
At first, I thought that Soraya’s story was much too similar to The Third Eye films. However, while the foundation may seem the same, the building is a marked improvement. The atmosphere is creepier, especially when combined with that lingering sense of foreboding. The development of the characters is still a bit lacking, but there is a better attempt at world building with the help of some visceral flashback sequences. The work towards developing the build up towards the big, twisty reveals is also greatly improved. Soraya has also noticeably upped the ante on the violence, blood and gore and significantly well-choreographed jump scares.
Indigo is basically Soraya’s opportunity to showcase his improved test model from his previous films. He still incorporates the depth of a sisterly bond by interweaving a dark and disturbing family secret that can have an adverse effect on humanity. However, I still think that Soraya should have gone for a significant change of the family dynamic, rather than repeating the same arc of the conveniently orphaned sisters. I can see the audience turning away from the film before the second act hits, thinking that there is just going to be lots of the same thing that we got in The Third Eye films. But if you can stick it out, you’ll find that the film is highly entertaining, and the finale is quite the shocker and kind of leaves the door open once again for a continuation of the story.
Indigo is currently available on Netflix for streaming.
Dark Alice Score: 5.5 out of 10
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Dark Alice has an old soul and a curious mind. I believe that anyone can be a hero and that the good guys should always win! I dislike cruelty to animals and think that they have far superior qualities to humans. My motto is there is no future without the past. I also have a weird penchant for Paranormal TV shows even though the slightest sound makes me jump. I enjoy writing reviews and throwing in fun facts to pique the readers’ curiosity. My ultimate goal in life would be to become a published writer one day. Read More