quickie movie review: The Ring 2
The writer's target audience is, I assume, people who are so dumb that they wouldn't get the first 15 or so reminders that the kid only calls his mother Rachel so he included, for the benefit of the single digit IQ viewers of this film, an additional 755 hints, all dropped like a seven ton anvil on your head in the guise of the most annoying child actor this side of Haley Joel Osment.
Which really takes away from what would have otherwise been a rather generic, uneven, predictable, poorly directed, hastily written, nonsenical ghost story with a couple of moments of suspense but no real peek-through-your-hands scenes.
And I see from the preview of Dark Water that I was forced to sit through that Ring 2 director Hideo Nakata has essentially taken all the elements from The Ring movies and dumped them in more urban setting, with Jennifer Connolly doing the fixed-face-of-bewilderment this time.
Comments
Robots, on the other hand, did not actually suck. There were even laugh-out-loud moments, and not just for the kidlets.
Posted by: Sekimori | March 20, 2005 05:13 PM
I just hope "Sin City" doesn't blow chunks.
Posted by: mbruce | March 20, 2005 08:17 PM
Let me recommend a couple of Japanese movies that are much more interesting (at least I think so). Audition and 2LDK. Neither are exactly "scarry" movies, but they're both pretty sick - in a good way. I know 2LDK is on dvd, I'm not sure about Autition yet.
Posted by: Beth | March 20, 2005 10:59 PM
Then don't...DO NOT...rent The Grudge with "Buffy." Piece. Of. Crap.
I agree with Sekimori, Robots had all three of us laughing maniacally. Why is having your pop culture turned on it's head and shoved back in your face funny? I dunno...but it is.
Posted by: Timmer | March 21, 2005 06:26 AM
If anyone is interested in weird/sicko Japanese movies...let me suggest "Ichi the Killer".
It's waaaayyy out there.
Posted by: Randy | March 21, 2005 06:28 AM
I have a vague memory from Ring 1 about Rachel actually being the kid's aunt and legal guardian... technically his mother, but not biologically... maybe that's why he calls her that.
Just thinking...
Posted by: Josh Cohen | March 21, 2005 09:04 AM
Nope, Josh. This was a very obvious plot ploy. She even says to him "you could call me mommy once in a while," to which he replies something about Rachel sounding stronger.
Later, Samara calls her "mommy."
Posted by: michele | March 21, 2005 09:07 AM
If Hitchcock is your thing, y'all should check out a feature-length anime called "Perfect Blue."
Posted by: Shawn | March 21, 2005 12:44 PM
Dark Water is actually a remake of another Japanese film by the author of the ring. The Ring's remakes (I and II) actually borrow heavily from Dark Water by using Dark Water's 'water leak' imagery. So, The Ring (American Version) actually borrows from Dark Water, not the other way around. If you watch Ringu (The original Ring movie) you will notice Sadako/Samara has dry hair. The girl in Dark Water has the wet hair in front of the face thing going on. The director of The Ring decided this was a creepier effect, and took it for The Ring. Same thing goes for the flooding.
Kong
Posted by: Kong | March 21, 2005 01:49 PM
Michelle,
Right on: The Ring was cool because it was essentially a "chain letter." "Ring 2" is "just another horror flick." In fact, the first movie dosn't make any sense in the context of the second: if the solution in the first was to watch the tape and pass it on, then what the hell was the deal with the second? I could tear apart the plot but it would be wasted time.
And that "mommy" business was soooo overdone. And frankly, the thing should have just ended after the "drowning exorcism". The subsequent scene was a huge waste of film...
Posted by: Ian | March 21, 2005 03:27 PM
Ditto on Robots - saw it last week when I went down to SC to visit my bro and his family.
Posted by: IgwanaRob | March 21, 2005 07:18 PM