Ringing In My Ears

I'll start this by saying that I'm a huge fan of the Japanese movie Ringu, and have been for a long time. (I'll use the Japanese names for the Japanese movies, and American for American, just to avoid confusion.) So long, in fact, that I own a VHS dub of the movie, because, when I bought it, the movie was unavailable on Region 1 or 0 DVD. Loved that one so much that I bought the rest in the series: Ringu 2 and Ringu 0: Birthday, also on VHS dubs, because they aren't available on DVD either. And I'm not the only one who loves the original Ringu. It was one of the highest grossing movies in Japanese history, and it spawned hundreds of imitators. At one point, every horror movie released in Southeast Asia featured a doppleganger of Sadako, the friendly ghost from Ringu. So, of course, it was only a matter of time of time before Hollywood, the Land of No Original Ideas, got in on the action. (I assume that, since Pearl Harbor, all Americans are afraid of Japanese people, and would rather see American actors instead of scary Japanese actors. So, we get remakes instead of rereleases.) And, hence, The Ring.

And, as it turns out, The Ring was actually pretty good. It's a noisy, glossy, stepped-on version of Ringu, but, for those who haven't seen that, it's a pretty scary movie. (A note on the title of The Ring: The "ring" of the title refers to the halo of light around the opening of the top of the well, as seen from the bottom: a literal "ring" of light. I always thought "ring" referred to the ringing of the phone. After reading Koji Suzuki's recently translated source material, I now know that "ring" refers to the infinite loop created by the spreading of the cursed video. A pretty highminded idea, yes, and not one that Hollywood seemed to grasp. So they invented the whole thing about an actual ring: THE Ring.) And it was a big hit. So, you know what comes next: The Ring 2.

I'll start this by saying The Ring 2 is one of the lower forms of entertainment: a sequel of a remake. And it is pretty lowly entertainment. But it's not entirely the producers' fault. If they'd have gone with a remake of Ringu 2, they'd have a train wreak on their hands, because Ringu 2 itself is a train wreak. (There were actually two sequels to Ringu, produced independently of one another: Rasen, which follows Suzuki's book of the same title, and Ringu 2, an original work by Hideo Nakata, the director of Ringu (and, ironically, The Ring 2). Ringu 2, probably because it contained "Ringu" in the title, was a hit, and Rasen flopped.) Not that they could have anyway, because they altered the story of Ringu so much, that none of the events in Ringu 2, if presented straightforwardly in a remake, would have made any sense. But Ringu 2 is still enjoyable, because it's such gonzo filmmaking. Two minor characters from Ringu are the main characters, there are about 50 plot threads, it has more scary bits than Ringu, and gets so fucking goofy toward the end that it's hard not to enjoy. The Ring 2 is also pretty fucking goofy, but not in an enjoyable way.

Rachel and Aidan, the deadbeat mom and creepy kid from the first movie, are back again. They've moved away from Seattle to little Astoria after the events of The Ring. (It's odd that no mention is made of the fact that Rachel had to kill her father to relieve her son of the "video curse", but I guess that's not important.) But, just when they think they're out, they get pulled back in when a copy of the cursed tape resurfaces and kills once again. I actually don't know why I mentioned this plot point, as it is never mentioned again in the film; it's just a scary bit to start the movie, I suppose. (This movie also fails to solve a logical problem that also occurs in Ringu 2: If only Rachel made a copy of the tape, how do more turn up? Maybe I'm thinking too much; I guess this is why I'm not a screenwriter.) This reappearance of the killer tape does bring to Rachel's attention the fact that her son is slowly being possessed by Samara, that lovely ghost from the tape. And so, we're off on just a really great adventure!

Actually, not really. I thought having Nakata, the director of the Ringu movies, on board would make this a good movie, but he's apparently had his ability to create suspense, inherent in all Asian directors, sucked out of him. He's Hollywood all the way now. And this movie isn't suspenseful at all. The Girl, a notorious loud noise jumper, remained planted in her seat like the Rock of Gibraltar: A very bad indicator for an allegedly "scary" movie. It also doesn't make any sense; mind you, Ringu 2 didn't make any sense either, but at least it had the sense to get so far off the boat that it didn't matter. The Ring 2 is just not good. Don't see it. You'll thank me later. And speaking of later...

Later this summer, a movie called Dark Water is coming out. It too, like The Rings 1 and 2, is an American remake of a Nakata/Suzuki collaboration. When that comes out, do yourself a favor: Track down Ringu, Ringu 2, and Honogurai Mizu No Soko Kara (the Japanese title for Dark Water), and watch them instead. Then you'll really see what happens when you put these two Japanese Masters of Horror together. They suck ass on this side of the Pacific; they're much better on their home turf.