Ringu

The short story goes something like this:
"He wanted to go out and play, but there was a TV show that he didn’t want to miss. So, he recorded it on a VCR in their room, but the channels there are different from Tokyo’s. No stations use that channel, so nothing should’ve recorded. But when he played the tape back at home, a woman appeared on the screen and said ‘You will die in one week!’ The kid stopped the tape and then the phone rang. A voice said ‘You saw it!’ and the kid died a week later.” 

One of the most successful bits of Japanese horror is director Hideo Nakata’s (Kaidan) “RINGU” (1998) which has become one of the world’s top horror franchises. The film is based on the novel by Koji Suzuki that has spawned 4 movies (“Ringu”, “Rasen”, “Ringu 2”, “Ringu 0: Birthday”), an American remake (“The Ring” with Naomi Watts), a Korean version (“The Ring Virus”), a manga and later on a Japanese TV series that portrays its premise in different situations. Most people may wonder why Hideo Nakata’s “Ringu” has been made as a perfect example as to how a horror movie should be done. The heart of the film’s premise is about a curse, supernatural forces, psychic abilities, murder, karma and the vindictive wrath from beyond this reality.
 

          

         
 
A beautiful single mother/reporter named Reiko Asakawa (Nanako Matsushima) is currently probing into the local urban myth that involves students watching a mysterious video, followed by a phone call and death in 7 days. This myth hits close to Reiko’s backyard when a niece dies and her other three friends exactly one week after their weekend together. The autopsies reveal no wrong doing, no trauma, the victims’ hearts seemed to have just stopped; with their faces expressing an utter fear of something.
 

After Reiko follows the clues to her niece’s past whereabouts, she discovers the tape in an old inn and watches it. Now she fears that she may be under the spell of the same curse that killed Tomoko, her niece. Reiko enlists the aid of her ex-husband Ryuji (Sanada Hiroyuki) to help her solve the mystery and lift the curse. Ryuji is also a medium aside from being a professor at a school and he also watches the tape to find its hidden clues. The two are in a race against time as they both only have one week to lift the curse, and what makes it worst is the fact that their son, Yoichi had also watched the cursed video tape. Following the clues, the two are led to a forty year old mystery about a woman named Shizuko, her daughter, Sadako and a man named Ikuma.
 

“Ringu” became successful because of its brilliant simplicity. Director Nakata doesn’t approach the film with displays of jump scares, gore and violence like other successful J-horror movies such as “Junk” during this time. The film’s aim is to unsettle the viewer, and once your balance is off, the film makes you more receptive to the plot’s darker plot devices. The film follows the methodical character-driven approach for classic J-horror movies such as “Onibaba” and “Kwaidan” that is also followed by “Audition”. The film is methodical in its approach, as it keeps the viewer on the edge with psychological claustrophobia. Elaborate special effects and visual style (much like in the American remake) is not a strong factor in the screenplay, “Ringu” draws you in through the cerebral factor that draws you in slowly through its plot, as the viewer becomes invested, the more they would feel that something very evil and threatening is about to take place. 

        

 The film’s strong points begins with its characters. When Ryuji arrives in Reiko’s house, the meeting between Yoichi and Ryuji felt very uneasy to portray the emotional distance between father and son. Reiko is a woman who is committed to her job, her skills as a reporter may have come to good use but it also proved to be the catalyst for the horrific events. I loved the fact that Ryuji was portrayed as a medium and a minor psychic, that this characterization gave certain scenes more credibility. The film also answers more questions and gets to uncover more details than any of its counterparts. However, one flaw that the film has is that it also left some questions unanswered as to the origins of the tape; I thought this was a little clumsy since it relied on the viewers who read the book to fill in the gaps.
 

There are several key differences in the Japanese original and the American remake. One is the “horse” subplot, another is the child shown drawing “rings”, the father is a mere photographer whereas in the original he is more in touch with the supernatural. Sadako is named Samara in the Americanized version and her mother jumps at the ocean rather than into a volcano. There are also differences in the video tape itself, but the spirit and the continuity of the original film remains whole.
 

I loved “Ringu” and after each viewing, my fondness for the  American remake becomes less. (The Korean version was a tad better than the U.S. version) It all depends on what you prefer; a slow-burning but detailed fleshed out story and breathing characters with a minimal exercise in horrific tone that relies on shocks and pay off or a polished, dumbed-down horror movie (when comparing it to the original) that has some formulaic horror devices? Any version of this story would prove entertaining, but after you see both movies, you may ask which one is better…it is common for Japanese horror movies not to have a happy “Hollywood” ending. Asian films have the guts to ask the motivation and questions its viewers while Hollywood likes to spoon-feed the answers. Think about it, horror should be thought-provoking and should not be afraid to ask questions. “Ringu” was first and the original is always better.
 

Highly Recommended!! [4 ½ + Stars]

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