The Great Wall of Horror: Open your 3rd Eye with Mata Batin
By Devin Shea
On this edition of The Great Wall of Horror, we trek to Indonesia to see a truly scary and horrifying new Netflix addition, The 3rd Eye (“Mata Batin”).
Thank you, fair readers, for returning back to The Great Wall of Horror. We have been limited in our travels, visiting Hong Kong, South Korea and India, but in this installment we will stretch our reaches to farther points of Asia. Netflix is killing it with its new additions of Asian horror that doesn’t just focus on Japanese or Korean horror. Today we’re looking at a new edition to Netflix, the 2017 Indonesian release of Mata Batin or The 3rd Eye.
Image courtesy of Hitmaker Studios
The 3rd Eye was written by Rocky Soraya, Riheam Junianti, and Fajar Umbara and directed by Soraya. It stars Jessica Mila as Alia, Bianca Hello as Abel, Danny Sumargo as Davin, and Citra Prima as Bu Windu.
The story follows two sisters, Alia and her younger sister, Abel. When Abel was young, she used to see people that others couldn’t and her sister never understood. Many years pass and Alia moves from Jakarta to Bangkok for work. After receiving a call that both of her parents were killed in a horrific car accident, she returns to Jakarta with her boyfriend Davin to care for her sister.
The parents leave the sisters their childhood home, but the memories for Abel aren’t the happy memories Alia has. When Alia goes to Bu Windu to get her 3rd eye forced open to prove her sister isn’t seeing ghosts, she realizes she has made a horrible mistake that cannot be undone. Furthermore, there’s something in her childhood home that she can finally see.
Image courtesy of Hitmaker Studios
Mata Batin (The 3rd Eye) is very well made. The film quality and transition shots are gorgeous and seamless. There was one panning shot of a room that didn’t just pan in one successive shot but moved its way around in a way I hadn’t seen before.
While the effect of the shadow people is less than stellar due to the CGI, the practical effects of injuries, gore and spirit movement within household objects were scary to watch. There are more twists and turns in this movie than a mountain highway and it really keeps you interested. While some moments in the film drag a bit longer than they should, they more than make up for it in story and visual effects.
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The 3rd Eye (Mata Batin) is scary, intense and full of frights. It’s a little bit supernatural, a little bit zombie, a little bit murder mystery and 100% worth your time. The 3rd Eye is available to stream right now on Netflix. If this doesn’t sound like your type of movie, check out past installments of The Great Wall of Horror: we have explored Spooky Spooky, Train to Busan, Out of the Dark and Ghoul. What Asian horror do you want to see on the Great Wall next? Let us know in the comments!
Next. Hungry Pigs and Horse Heads: 9 scary gangster movie scenes. dark
Lover of Asian horror? Seen The 3rd Eye (“Mata Batin”)? Let the other fear feigns know what you think in the comment section below.