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Ringu Director: Hideo Nakata Number of Items: 1 Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen Format: Color, Widescreen, Dolby Audience Rating: Unrated Running Time: 100 minutes Studio: Universal Studios Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Region Code: 1 Product Group: DVD Release Date: 2003-03-04 Buy from Amazon |
 "I had high expectations for this movie"Too bad they weren't met. After recently having the wits scared out of me by "Ju-On" (the Japanese original of the American remake, "The Grudge."), I couldn't wait to watch "Ringu." Unfortunately, I was left bewildered by all the praise for this movie. Apart from a few shocking moments--especially the ending), it just wasn't scary. I'm surprised to say, the Hollywood remake was much more effective--even though it's not that great of a movie itself. If you want an example of truly chilling Japanese horror, pick up "Ju-On." That film is flat out terrifying.  "Original "This is a pretty creative story, and although I did see the American version first, I credit this for it's originality and eeriness. One thing that affects all of us is we like to watch videos, so to suggest that to do something so simple could be horrorfying is pretty cool. Although the American version is more visually detailed, the faces of the victims resembling drowned victims is much more clever than the scared to death faces of Ringu since the girl did drown to death, also the video tape in the American version was more disturbing, however the American version left more holes in the actual story that Ringu cleared up for me. For instance the reason the little girl was... the way she was. Ringu is a little more scientific, explaining the girl to be protective of her Mother where in The Ring the girl seemed to be simply pure evil. I've found Ringu to be more interesting and less horrorfying than The Ring. But there is one thing that both movies were equal about and begged the question, where is DHS?  "Wait Until the End"Having been a fan of horror movies since I was a kid, I've come to a point where nothing scares me. Then one day I saw Ringu and its slow pace at first turned me off but when I reached the end not only was I truly scared, I was scared for days after, even just thinking about it. I've become a fan of Japanese horror movies and Dark Water was just as scary. I love American horror, but sometimes it's just so obvious and they always go for the blood and gore. Now I like the slow pace, watching the characters doing daily chores, just like we do in our lives. They seem a lot more like real people than in American horror films so the horror that they experience makes you think that it could happen to you. Face it, none of us are going skinning dipping in a lake and having a guy with a chainsaw come after us, but all of us go to the grocery store, make dinner and many of us pick kids up from school. It's the monsters that invade our normal lives which have the power to terrify. "A well done foreign film!""Ringu" is a 1998 film that set the stage for the American remake, "The Ring". The story is this, a reporter in Japan looks for clues after people watch this weird videotape that says that they will die in a week. Then they die after 7 days. What she discovers is quite shocking. This film is not as scary as The Ring, and it only has one curse word. [The D-word]Since it was made in Japan, it has Japanese talking with English subtitles. This movie will freeze your blood! "A Japanese Horror Classic"I think it's difficult to write a review for this movie without comparing and contrasting it with the US remake, but I will do my best. In my opinion, neither film is perfect. Some things worked better in Ringu, and some things worked better in The Ring. But what I loved about both films is the way that both stories are different from each other, so that you can watch both and get something out of each one. The new trend of remaking Asian horror films seems to come from this movie. I can't understand why people get so upset about it, though. For one thing, before the remake, it was impossible to get the original in America. If you think this is such a great movie, why wouldn't you want more people to see it? Also, with all the films Hideo Nakata has made, this is by no means his best work. Most people I hear complaining about the American remake have never even seen anything else he's ever done. Most importantly, with this film in particular, a remake is a very fitting choice, because it actually fits into the context of the story. I can't elaborate on that, but when you see it, you'll understand what I mean. The story centers around Asakawa, her son Yoichi, and her ex-husband Ryuji. Asakawa is a reporter investigating rumors surrounding a mysterious video tape that local youths have been saying will kill the viewer one week after watcing it. The inquiries take on a more personal meaning for her when her niece turns up dead under unexplained circumstances. After a bit of poking around, Asakawa finds herself in the presence of the killer videotape. So what does she do? Of course she watches it! Now that may not sound like the smart thing to do in a situation like this. At least the other unsuspecting victims watched it by mistake. But you know how those snoopy reporters are. If you found a copy of a videotape that killed people, wouldn't you at least want to know what was on it? Unfortnunately, the payoff isn't that great. The videotape is a mishmash of weird yet boring images, and if I had turned in something like that for my experimental film project in "Film Analysis: Formalist and Feminist" class, I would not have passed. Once Asakawa has gotten over her initial curiosity, she freaks out and calls Ryuji to help her find out what she can do to break that curse. The main problem I have with this film is the character of Ryuji. He is fascinating, and the actor playing him is very talented. However, his character has had such a great arc from the novel, to the film, to the remake, that it seems that the screenwriter didn't know what to do with him. In the novel, Asakawa is a man, and Ryuji is his detestable friend. He despises humankind, and entertains Asakawa with stories about breaking into women's houses and raping them. I think making Asakawa a female, and Ryuji her ex was a brilliant move. They've got seven days to find the origin of the video tape, which is not nearly long enough to reconcile their personal differences. However, his character had to undergo a great transformation between the novel and the film. If they had him be as reprehensible as he was in the book, a strong female like Asakawa never would have had anything to do with him. However, they had to keep some of his jerkiness in tact, because they were filming the sequel at the same time, and his evil nature played a part in it. (This is "Rasen," not "Ring 2." "Rasen" is based on the second novel, but the movie turned out so crappy that Nakata had to make his own alternate sequel, "Ring 2," which was a completely new idea.) So Ryuji appears here as somewhat of a contradiction between two selves. And for some reason, they chose to give him psychic powers. His psychic abilities were not in the novel, and I don't think they added anything to the story. His powers allow the villian, a young woman named Sadako, to appear right in front of him when he's sitting on a park bench. He remains calm, and actually speaks to her. Then later, when they want to make him be scared, he is so scared that he can't move. The character is interesting, but disjointed. In the remake, the writer seemed to consider all of this, and made Noah, the ex, a complete flake, and somewhat of a coward. His contribution was his expertise in video equipment, not a staggering intellect. It is difficult to say too much more about this film, as there is so much more to learn that I don't want to give away too soon. But what works here is that the story makes use of modern technology intertwined with a traditional ghost story. Televisions, VCR's, telephones, these are all modern inventions not usually associated with ghosts. We don't typically put ghosts and technology together because they are otherworldly in death, and it is assumed that they came from a more primitive time in life, before these things were invented. That's why a techno update of the ghost story works, because it scares us with things we never thought of as scary before. If you are a fan of the recent wave of Japanese horror, or the American version of The Ring, you owe it to yourself to see this film. It should be noted that the famous scene near the end that everyone remembers from The Ring was not in the novel, but was an invention of Hideo Nakata. |
