Let me be very clear: director Gareth Evans’ The Raid, an Indonesian martial arts epic that tracks a SWAT team sweeping through a highrise infested with drug dealers, is a phenomenal action movie that demands to be seen.  Thankfully, Sony Pictures Classics will be releasing it on March 23, so everyone needs to circle their calendars right now.  Trust me, once you see this, you’ll understand why every critic at TIFF and last week’s Sundance Film Festival was raving.  It also explains why Screen Gems acquired the remake rights.  It’s really that good.

While at Sundance I was able to sit down with Evans for an extended interview.  We talked about getting The Raid into both TIFF and Sundance, getting the project financed, how they pulled off the action scenes, film vs. digital, and the American remake.  Evans is currently doing pre-production on the sequel, so he revealed the working title (Berandal, which means Thug), the budget, how he wants to shoot in anamorphic widescreen, the expectations, and how he wants to incorporate a car chase.  He says, “I want to bring car chase elements to it as well. So we have like a cool fight scene where you go inside a car, fighting against four people as it’s speeding along a one-way.”  Hit the jump for more.