THE FOLLOWING WEBSITE IS SUPPORTED BY: 

Back to the review page

SUMMARY

Journalist Reiko Asakawa is a hard-working single mother who rarely is able to spend time with her young son Yoichi. After hearing about the mysterious death of her niece she attends her funeral and notices a cluster of young girls who also attended her niece's school.  She consults the girl's friends and they tell her about a tape. Once viewed, the phone rings, but no one is there, and from that moment you have seven days left in which to live. Thinking this tape is nothing more than an urban legend Reiko is dubious of the girls' words. However, it appears the tape claimed more lives than just her niece's. All victims were found dead, their bodies and faces frozen in horror. Reiko decides to look into this bizarre occurrence further.

Following the information her niece's friends gave her, Reiko discovers the tape the girls told her about at the lodge where her niece stayed. She places it in the VCR and a strange and disturbing array of images appear, but there is no sound. Then, the phone rings, but no one is there. At that moment she begins to think that maybe the urban legend was true after all.

Not knowing what to do and worrying about the safety of her son Reiko turns to Ryuji Takayama. The two have some sort of a relationship, but it is unclear exactly what it is at first. She shows him the tape and the same thing happens to him. So that she and Ryuji can search for answers before it's too late Reiko takes Yoichi to her father's to look after the boy, but the unthinkable happens. Reiko wakes in the middle of the night to find Yoichi watching the tape.

Now, Reiko and Ryuji must break the curse to save themselves and Yoichi from an unknown malevolence before Reiko's seventh day.

DVD VISION TEST

Video: Nice picture quality. Originally I watched the tape, and that was a bit difficult due to the grainy quality of the picture.  With the DreamWorks version, it has a good constitution, but the color is a bit faded. Since the DVD picture was in the letterbox format, there was a black space below in which they put the subtitles. Now, why can't they do that with anime? Also, there was no pixelation; not even around the subtitles. It was very easy to read.

Audio: The only track on this DVD is the Japanese Audio Track although there is subtitling in English, Spanish, and even French! The Sound Quality was pretty good. There was little to no music, which wasn't covered by the dialogue, nor did it cover the dialogue. At times I felt Reiko (when speaking quietly) sounded a bit muffled, but other than that I thought the sound quality was pretty good.

Edits: I don't believe there were any edits. If there were you couldn't tell.

Extras: If you thought the extras department on The Ring were bad the ones for Ringu are even worse. There is scene selection, and a very short trailer for The Ring and some other DreamWorks movies, but not Ringu. Also, there were no Easter eggs as far as I could tell. It's a pretty bare bones DVD in the extras department.

WIDESCREEN REVIEW

Acting: 

WARNING: THIS SECTION OF THE REVIEW CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS!!!!

Since this is the first live movie I have reviewed I am going to do things a little differently. Instead of having my voice acting column in which I compare and contrast I am just going to talk about the Japanese language version of Ringu for the main characters. After all, that was the only language it was in.

Reiko

Nanako Matsushima- Although the majority of her work is television and film you can catch this very talented actress in GTO as the voice of Azusa. As the leading lady Reiko I felt she did a wonderful job of portraying strength in the face of fear. You get the feeling that although she is frightened she is going to do whatever it takes to protect her son. It seems that at first she doesn't really care about herself or family because she is so consumed with work, but when she and her family are threatened she drops work in order to save them. Ms. Matsushima did a wonderful of job of slowly working the desirable characteristics of Reiko's personality into Reiko. Also, I felt the chemistry between her and Mr. Sanada was perfect. At first they seem like colleagues or even friends, but then there is that slight awkwardness between them. At this time you discover that she and Ryuji were husband and wife and that Yoichi is their son. Ryuji is even more distant to Yoichi than Reiko is. He doesn't even remember what year of school he is in. Over the time that Reiko and Ryuji spend together trying to reveal the truth behind the tape and how to stop the curse they develop their relationship and are ready to become a family again. The development of the relationship was done very well. I really liked Reiko. I felt Ms. Matsushima did an excellent of job of portraying a fearful, yet strong and protective woman.

Ryuji

Hiroyuki  Sanada- Another very talented actor, the work he has done has primarily been television and movies. As the supporting role of the  (for all you X-Files fans out there) Mulder-esque character Ryuji Mr. Sanada does an excellent job of portraying a man who appears calm and collected on the outside, but on the inside is at the verge of meltdown. When Reiko appears to Ryuji and asks him for help Ryuji is a bit skeptical as to what she could want, but when she tells him about the tape and he takes the picture of her (which comes out distorted) Ryuji knows its more serious than anything he could imagine. She shows him the tape and now he too has seven days left to live. His perspective on life changes completely and he wholeheartedly assists Reiko in discovering the truth behind the tape and putting an end to the curse. Slightly psychic, Ryuji begins having strange flashes about the people in the tape, and becomes an invaluable asset to solving the mystery.

Yoichi

Rikiya Otaka- Launching his career with this movie, Rikiya Otaka was very good as Reiko's son Yoichi. Yoichi appears to be a shy and quiet boy, and doesn't seem to have the closeness with his mother that he does with his grandfather. There is definitely a lack of emotion between the two. Although she is a good provider for him and she certainly takes care of him she is unable to give him the nurturing motherly compassion he needs. As a result Yoichi is very distanced from her, and you can tell that both mother and son regret it. Mr. Otaka did a wonderful job of exhibiting the distinction of closeness with his grandfather and the distance with his mother. When Yoichi is with his grandfather he is a child; happy and carefree. He fishes in the stream by the house and acts the way a young boy should act. When he is with his mother he questions the death of "young people" and also he is constantly asking her when she will be home. He definitely needs her attention and although he asks he doesn't seem terribly disappointed when she tells him she has to work. He has come to expect it of her and rather than getting emotional he distances himself even more.

Sadako

Rie Inou- was a perfect choice as the creepy girl Sadako. Probably having the toughest role in the movie since she doesn't speak and you never see her face it really is a credit to her acting ability that she was able to creep me out. I am not one of those people who scares easily. There were hardly any special effects involved. You never see her face, but the body movement and posture was so bizarre and disturbing that she didn't need any special effects to enhance her performance. Wonderful job!

I felt that Mr. Sanada, Ms. Matsushima, and Ms. Rie Inou were right in their element and became their characters, but I would have liked to see a bit more from Mr. Otaka. He was overall too sterile for a little boy and although it enhanced the creepiness of the movie I felt it would have been more effective if he started off acting like a little boy and then became withdrawn and creepy.

SOUND OUT:

A Little Background History- For those of you who are unfamiliar with the history of Ringu it started off as a series of creepy investigation books, which reached the shelves of Japan during the 1990's and horrified and thrilled Japanese audiences. Soon, it became a movie divided into two parts; Ringu and Spiral, which were released in the mid 90's, and were so wildly successful they were followed by yet another sequel. The American re-make of Ringu called The Ring was very close in concept and in story to the original movie Ringu, but its never had the following the original had. 

I really liked both versions, but upon watching Ringu now for the second time I have found it to be more of a complete story. There are plot holes and some serious story stretching that I really hated in The Ring, which weren't even in Ringu.

For example, in The Ring I thought the bit about the "Horses keeping her awake" was so lame. I mean HORSES? Samara goes on killing sprees cause of horses being noisy? Now let's think about this for a second: Those of you who have gone off to college and have dealt with the noise emanating from a drunk student's room where the entire dorm is partying and you are trying catch up on much-needed sleep to be fresh and ready for a test during exam week, will relate the best to this. Now, I understand having some feelings about wanting to kill whatever it is keeping you awake, but do you act on those feelings? No! And I can tell you from experience a whole stable full of horses isn't half as noisy as one college student partying down. I know! I used to work at a horse farm. Now, I understand Samara is evil and all, but that isn't explained. Basically they tell us in the movie she is a monster and leave it at that. Sorry, but that wasn't enough information. I wanted them to tell me WHY she was a monster. Why is this little girl doing all of these horrible things? Also, the person who killed her in the American version was not the person who killed her in the Japanese version. Not that it would have really bothered me if they changed it for artistic purposes or story differentiation, but that wasn't the case. There was no reason given as to why the person who killed her did it other than the fact "she was a monster". Also, why did Rachael (after making the copy) have all of those weird flashes about the tape in the American version? Once she made the copy she was safe right? Anything that would have put her in danger according to the legend would have left her alone.... Hello, PLOT HOLE!

I admit, I saw The Ring before Ringu and I thought cinematographically it was very well done. Perfect use of color and fantastic special effects. Also, the story was much faster paced than Ringu, which tended to plod quite a bit, then get suspenseful, and then plod again and get suspenseful, but because there were so many moments in The Ring that tried to make me jump I ended up not being scared at all. Ringu creeped me out a lot more than The Ring did; especially in the most crucial scene of the movie.  The special effects were impressive in The Ring (as opposed to the early 90's almost Godzilla-esque special effects of Ringu), but I thought they took away from the element of horror. I would prefer to see good old-fashioned acting used to scare me as opposed to some C-G monster.

As to which one was scarier I felt it was definitely Ringu. Overall, The Ring will make you jump and it is very suspenseful, but Ringu is leaps and bounds scarier; especially Sadako over Samara. While Samara was very creepy looking and she had the freaky little girl voice in her favor it was what Sadako never said that was even creepier. You never see the entire face of Sadako. Its always covered by her long black hair. She never speaks, and its the slight glimpses of Sadako you catch that will certainly scare you more than seeing what she looks like. Remember, your imagination will scare you more than any concept of a movie monster will. Its this element that is used effectively, thus, in my opinion making Ringu a more effective horror story.

As for acting both versions are fantastic. You can't go wrong with either one, but if you hate subtitles don't watch the Japanese version. There is no dub for it. The American version is really wonderful. Naomi Watts is fantastic as the strong and intelligent Rachael. If you liked her in this definitely check her out in her first big American release Mulholland Drive Directed by David Lynch. Although he isn't one of my favorite directors it was an excellent movie. Martin Henderson also does a wonderful job as Noah (and besides he's really cute!) Daveigh Chase was ok as Samara, but I definitely prefer Rie Inou's Sadako. However, I thought David Dorfman did a better job as Rachael's withdrawn son Aidan than Rikiya Otaka did as Yoichi. 

Now, I am going to tell you a little story. Its about when I watched this movie for the second time with my friends who had never seen it before. I had one friend of mine visiting me for the weekend from MD. She was staying with me and was sleeping on the guest couch. We watched Ringu and afterwards she didn't want to go to sleep. She told me my TV was way too large, and too close to the ground for comfort and she would never get to sleep knowing some "crazy bitch might crawl through the screen at any moment". So, she ended up sleeping on the floor of my bedroom. I thought this was hysterical. We didn't even get to sleep until about 5am and she had to drive back to MD the next day. Now, the girl doesn't scare easily and when she watched The Ring she wasn't scared at all. She took great pleasure in watching her friends jump though! So, obviously we know which one she thought was scarier. Which one is going to scare you? I guess you'll have to tell me!  

Return to Top

Back to the Review Page