Iko Uwais was born in Jakarta, Indonesia, to Maisyaroh and Mustapha Kamaluddin. His grandfather, H. Achmad Bunawar, was a master of silat, an Indonesian traditional martial art, and founded a silat school. Iko himself has been learning silat since he was 10 years old. He became National Champion in 2005 in Silat Demonstration category. Iko’s talent as a martial arts actor was discovered by Welsh film Director, Gareth Evans, who visited Iko’s Silat school for a documentary in 2007. Evans then asked Iko to quit his daytime job as a driver in a telecommunications company and join Evans’ movie production company as the leading actor in his movies.
In his first acting experience in Merantau, Uwais played the role of a young Minang (West-Sumatran), which led him to learn the Minang style of silat harimau (tiger style) from Master Edwel Datuk Rajo Gampo Alam. Merantau was released in Indonesia on 6 August 2009. The film was featured in Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival in South Korea and Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas with highly positive reviews.[12][13][14] Merantau won the Best Film award at ActionFest 2010.[15][16]
Uwais’s second collaboration with Gareth Evans was The Raid (known as The Raid: Redemption in the United States), which began filming in mid-March 2011 and was released in mid-2012.[17] The movie has been hailed by critics and audiences in various festivals as one of the best martial art movies in years.[18]
Uwais collaborated on a third movie with Evans, The Raid 2. Uwais also appeared briefly in Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), alongside The Raid 2 co-star Yayan Ruhian.[5][19]
In 2016, he appeared in the martial arts film Headshot, which received generally positive reviews.[20]
In 2017, he filmed the international martial arts film Triple Threat, together with Tony Jaa, Tiger Chen, and Scott Adkins—the film was released in early 2019.[21] In 2018, Uwais starred in the films, Mile 22 and The Night Comes for Us.[22][23] In the same year, it was announced that Uwais was cast in the lead role of Kai Jin on the Netflix series, Wu Assassins.[24] The series premiered on 8 August 2019.[25]
In 2019, Uwais starred in the action comedy film Stuber alongside Kumail Nanjiani and Dave Bautista.[26] In the same year, it was announced that Uwais will appear in a film called China Town Express playing a man who must fight through the gangland of New York to save his family after the disappearance of his son during a gang’s killing spree.[27] Uwais is also attached to star in The Bellhop, one of the first five films in development by Balboa Productions, the new production company co-founded by Sylvester Stallone in 2018.[28]
Uwais will star next as Hard Master in Snake Eyes, a spin-off from the G.I. Joe movie franchise.[29][30] The film is set to be released on October 23, 2020.[31]
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