The film, released on 20 December 2012, drew the largest theatrical audience to date in Indonesian cinema history with 4.7 million viewers.[2] It also became MD Pictures' highest grossing film produced to date.
The film was followed by a prequel, Rudy Habibie in 2016, with Rahadian reprising his role.
Plot
In 1953 at her school in Bandung, Hasri Ainun Besari is matched by a teacher with Bacharuddin Jusuf "Rudy" Habibie for their intelligence, infatuating Rudy. In 1962, when accompanying his brother for an appointment, he meets Ainun, now a physician. They begin to fall in love. Rudy reveals that after finishing college in Aachen, Germany, he will return to Indonesia to innovate his home country. He proposes to Ainun, unable to promise luxury but eternal love. She accepts, and they marry and move to Aachen.
While Rudy works at a train company, Ainun is pregnant. The couple move to Hamburg after the birth of their son, Ilham Akbar Habibie. Earning Doctor of Engineering, Rudy sends a permit letter to create an aircraft to the Indonesian Aircraft Industry Commando, but they are not ready to accept. Ainun cheers him up by revealing a second baby, Thareq Kemal Habibie. She learns she has ovarian cancer, but does not tell Rudy. Missing the hospital environment, she reprises her role as a physician. Meanwhile, Ibnu Sutowo supports Rudy and flies him to Jakarta, where he has organized an engineering team. Rudy also becomes a cabinet minister. His blueprint of IPTN N-250 is approved by President Suharto, and manufacturing begins. Despite initial sentiments, the locals and the press praise its maiden flight on 10 August 1995.
Ainun requests a honeymoon, but it is delayed by Rudy's oath as Vice President, which causes him to be sleep deprived. Following the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the May 1998 riots, Suharto resigns, and Rudy becomes President. His initiation of the Reform era is criticized, and he is later accused of corruption. Ainun learns that her cancer is worsening; she tells the nurse to not reveal this to Rudy. A year into his presidency, Rudy realizes that the weight of his occupation is self-detrimental and resigns. The N-250 is abandoned following the crisis, exacerbated with the public's apathy on its possibility of developing local mobility. Rudy and Ainun later go on the honeymoon.
Rudy discovers that Ainun's cancer reached Stage IV, prompting him to fly with his family to Munich, where Ainun is hospitalized at the Universitätsklinikum Großhadern. Although surgery is successful, the cells have divided and spread; Rudy still believes Ainun will be cured, but the doctor says that cure is unguaranteed. Hopeless, Ainun's friend suggest that her funeral be organized; Rudy confronts her as it nears their marriage's 48th anniversary. Ainun dies on 22 May 2010. Rudy then revisits Ainun's home, where he imagines her interacting. The film ends with a video of Habibie visiting Ainun's grave; he says he will forever cherish memories with her.
This film was launched on 20 December 2012[where?], with its gala screening attended by then-President of Republic of Indonesia Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono[3] along with then-Governor of Jakarta and future-President Joko Widodo as well as Habibie himself.
