Minangkabau Silek Harimau: Evolving Oral Traditions, Performance, and Choreography

Abstract

AbstractIn 2010, an Indonesian movie titled Merantau won Best Film Award at ACTIONFEST, a festival dedicated to action films from around the world. Directed by the American Gareth Evans, this film presented a storyline based on the travels and conflicts encountered by a Minangkabau youth in his journey away from his home village in West Sumatra. The action scenes in the film used movements from silat, the traditional martial arts of West Sumatra, Indonesia. The leading actor, Iko Uwais, then an Indonesian unknown, became a star and went on to earn lead roles in Raid I and Raid II, both films by the same director, that also used silat movements. The action scenes in Merantau that drew so much attention were the fighting sequences choreographed following the motifs of traditional Minangkabau silat harimau (“tiger-style” fighting) movements. This genre was as yet unknown outside the martial arts scene because most of the choreography of fighting scenes in the film is based on Chinese or Japanese martial arts styles. Breaking away from that convention, the choreographer for the scenes in Merantau was Edwel Yusri Datuk Rajo Gampo Alam, a master and teacher of traditional tiger-style silat (or silek harimau) originating in West Sumatra. In the Minangkabau language, harimau means “tiger.” The word is also used in Bahasa Indonesia.