Uwais was born in Jakarta, Indonesia, and is the son of Maisyaroh and Mustapha Kamaluddin. His grandfather, H. Achmad Bunawar, was a silat master and founded a silat school.
Career
In 2007, Uwais was discovered by director Gareth Evans, who was filming a documentary about silat in Uwais's training hall. Uwais's natural charisma and great camera presence encouraged Evans to cast him as the leading role for his first martial art movie, Merantau. After signing a five-year contract with Gareth Evans and his production company, Uwais resigned from his daytime job as an operational driver at :id:Esia|Esia, an Indonesian telecom company. In his first acting experience in Merantau, Uwais played the role of a young Minang, which led him to learn the Minang style of silat harimau 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. Merantau won the Best Film award at ActionFest 2010. Uwais's second collaboration with Gareth Evans was The Raid, which began filming in mid-March 2011 and was released in mid-2012. The movie has been hailed by critics and audiences in various festivals as one of the best martial art movies in years. Uwais collaborated on a third movie with Evans, The Raid 2. Uwais also appeared briefly in , alongside The Raid 2 co-star Yayan Ruhian. In 2016, he appeared in the martial arts filmHeadshot, which received generally positive reviews. In 2017, he filmed the internationalmartial arts film Triple Threat, together with Tony Jaa, Tiger Chen, and Scott Adkins—the film was released in early 2019. In 2018, Uwais starred in the films, Mile 22 and The Night Comes for Us. In the same year, it was announced that Uwais was cast in the lead role of Kai Jin on the Netflix series, Wu Assassins. The series premiered on 8 August 2019. In 2019, Uwais starred in the action comedy filmStuber alongside Kumail Nanjiani and Dave Bautista. 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. 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. Uwais will star next as Hard Master in Snake Eyes, a spin-off from the G.I. Joe movie franchise. The film is set to be released on October 23, 2020.
Personal life
On June 25, 2012, Uwais married singer Audy Itemat the Hotel Gran Mahakam in Jakarta. The couple have two daughters, Atreya Syahla Putri Uwais and Aneska Layla Putri Uwais. Uwais is a Muslim.
