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Dark Water Director: Hideo Nakata Number of Items: 1 Format: Color, Dolby Audience Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested) Running Time: 100 minutes Studio: A.D. Vision Product Group: DVD Release Date: 2005-06-21 Buy from Amazon

From Amazon.com Dark Water is Japanese horror auteur Hideo Nakata's return to the genre after his Ring cycle made you too scared to watch television ever again. Where Ringu dealt with a supernatural force wreaking revenge via technology, this film is a much more traditional ghost story. After winning a custody battle for her daughter, single mother Yoshimi moves into what she thinks is the perfect apartment with her daughter Hitomi. No sooner have they unpacked than strange things begin to disturb their new life. A water leak from the supposedly abandoned apartment above gets bigger and bigger, a child's satchel reappears even though Yoshimi throws it away several times, and she is haunted by the image of a child wearing a yellow mackintosh who bears a striking resemblance to a young girl who disappeared several years before. The conventional narrative follows Yoshimi's increasingly desperate attempts to discover who or what force is haunting her daughter, but the story's execution is far from predictable. Nakata is the master of understated suspense: there's always a feeling of motiveless malignancy that runs like an undercurrent through his films--far more frightening than out and out shocks--and here he also practically drowns his audience in water imagery. The film is saturated; the relentless dripping in the apartment, the constant rain outside and the deliberately washed-out photography make any color, such as the yellow coat, seem incongruous and unsettling. Nakata also clears the film of unnecessary characters--this is an almost deserted Tokyo--preferring to concentrate the action on Yoshimi's rising hysteria as she struggles to understand what is happening and how to save her daughter. Granted, the special effects are somewhat unconvincing and the ending confused, but even so the result is a stylish and disquieting chiller that will do for bathtubs what his Ring films did for video recorders. --Kristen Bowditch From Description No one loses their mind instantly – Sanity seeps away one drop at a time. Yoshimi simply wanted a better life – for both herself and her daughter Ikuko. Unfortunately, such wishes may sometimes be hard to come by. The custody battle has grown embittered and hurtful, her new job is less than desirable, and Ikuko’s schoolwork has taken a turn for the worse. But, Yoshimi has something bigger to worry about. Something upstairs. Something cold and dank. Something that should have never been.

Customer Reviews: Total numer of reviews: 31 Average rating: 4.0 "Are you my mother?" I don't see what is so terrifying about little Japanese girls with dark hair wondering about, leaving a trail of water, looking for someone to replace a mother who abandoned them. It's been done in the Ring, Grudge, and now this movie. Just because it takes place in a dliapidated old apartment doesn't make it any scarier. The only amusing part of the film I thought was the bumbling old "security" guard owner of the place who doesn't do jack when it comes to safety precautions. This movie is bad bad bad. What a waste of time...I do agree with the other reviewer about one aspect - if you do subject yourself to this terrible film please watch it in Japanese. You won't take anything serious from it watching it in English. I was chuckling the entire time because the screenplay didn't match the emotions of the speakers. My rating: D- "A Creepy film to watch with the lights off!" After tenuously winning a custody battle for her six year old daughter Yoshimi Matsubara played by the understated actress Hitomi Kuroki tries to make a new start for herself and her child. Emotionally fragile, the product of divorced parents herself Yoshmi desperately wants her daughter to have a more stable upbringing than she had, but with the interference of a vindictive ex-husband she is having a hard time of it and she has to find a new place to live and a job, not to mention the fact her daughter will have to start a brand new school. The apartment Yoshmi and her daughter Ikuko eventually move into isn't exactly the Ritz but it is a roof over their heads and is near to a good school. However strange things start to happen from the moment mother and daughter move into the apartment, like the shadow of a child glimpsed coming and going from the building especially in the lift. Also huge water stains appear on the ceiling of the apartment and drip constantly, as each day passes more and more liquid oozes into the rooms every day and Ikuko's Aunt complains that the water in the apartment is bad and brings her own water in to cook when has to babysit for Ikuko. Yoshmi calls the landlord in but he refuses to do anything about it, saying the building is damp from so much rain and what else should she expect? Add to this a child's red school bag shows up in odd places and soon a more physical manifestation of the child herself starts appearing and Ikuko finds herself an imaginary playmate that shares her bath and who talks to her in whispers that only she can hear does the little girl's mother start to really worry. Yoshmi eventually discovers the origin of the ghost and all hell is let loose as the young mother desperately tries to save her daughter from a vengeful child spirit whose own mother had deserted her a few years ago and whose death in the water tower on the top of the building has never been discovered. This is a seriously creepy movie; I thoroughly enjoyed it, no blood and gore, just tension, spooky moments to make you jump, a good dose of hysteria and all round good acting from the whole cast. I watched this film with the subtitles on, I can't stand dubbed films, they do my head in, but the subtitles didn't detract from the film at all. I'm not sure what the American version of "Dark Water" will be like, probably better special effects but I doubt if they will ever get that moment of terror when Yoshmi realises that the child she has pulled out of the bath is not her daughter but the child spirit who wants a mother and will do anything to get one. Superb! "Kinda like the Ring/the Ring 2, but more emotional" Dark water is about a mother who has recently divorced and is currently battling for custody of her daughter. The mother and her 5 year old girl move into a new apartment that appears to have a leak in the ceiling. As the leak gets worse, the daughter has increasingly unpleasant visits from a mysterious little girl in a yellow raincoat. This movie moves a little slow and is not very scary at all. It's similar to the Ring 2, because of the water theme and the ghost-girl-trying-to-steal-another-child's-mom story, but the Ring 2 sorta sucked. I felt no connection to the mother or the child, and they didn't seem to have a very strong bond. You couldn't "feel the love". And the kid in this movie is quite cute, while the child in the Ring was just plain creepy. I was rather teary towards the end of Dark Water, and I like movies that have emotion. All in all, this is not a scary movie and not a fast-paced movie, but pretty good. "Well.." It's got a solid plot, but wasn't that scary.. Or maybe I'm just a bum.. You chose! "This is not only a very good horror movie..." I waited for several months for this movie to be available to rent from Blockbuster, and am I glad I waited. This is not only a very good horror movie, but a very good movie. The acting and story are terrific, especially the little girl who played Ikuko. I haven't seen the American remake, but i can't imagine it being better than this movie.