Ringu (1998)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0178868/?ref_=nv_sr_1
Two girls are at a slumber party. One tells a story about a videotape that you
watch and some chick tells you that you are going to die in seven days. We’ve all heard the story. I got to say, this movie came out four years
before Ju-on and it looks way better.
They both are a little scared and then boom, the phone rings (for like a
really long time). Before that one of
the girls said she really did watch the video a week ago. Luckily for them it’s just their parents on
the phone. Then the TV turns on by itself,
which isn’t supposed to happen. The girl
turns it off only to have it pop on again.
This time, when she turns around she dies but we don’t get to see it.
"Son, turn your blank, soulless stare off for the funeral please"
A reporter named Asakawa is doing a story on the girl’s
death and attends the dead girl's funeral her weird little son Yoichi. Asakawa finds a picture of the girl when she
died and it does not look good. She’s
making a face like she has just seen the scariest thing ever while smelling the
stankiest thing of all time. Asakawa
then finds some pictures that the girl took just before death and her face came
out blurry in all of them.
Seven more days until Ender's Game
Because Asakawa is a good reporter I guess, she goes to the
hotel where the girl watched the video and finds a guestbook where someone wrote,
“My dad is fat. So is my mom. I’m fat too”.
It’s the funniest thing. She then
watches the video like a dumbass which shows just a bunch of random images
(woman brushing her hair in the mirror, the word eruption, a well) and then
gets the you have seven days to live call.
The next day, Asakawa calls over her ex Ryuji (captain Kaneda
from Sunshine) and tells him what happened.
He think’s its all bologna until he takes her picture and sees that it’s
all blurry. He watches it and doesn’t
get the phone call though. She makes him
a copy of the video and together they try to work out what to do. They come across a story where a woman on
some island where a lot of the things from the video are from predicted a volcano. She takes her kid to her grandfathers when
she has 3 days left and I guess Ryuji got the call too because he says he has
4. She wakes up that night and sees that
Yoichi is watching the video. Uh
oh. The boy says that the dead girl from
the first scene told him to watch it, which makes sense to both parents.
Did I eat Arbys twice yesterday?
Asakawa and Ryuji travel to the island where everything went
down. We learn some of the background
story on the woman brushing her hair in the video who had some kind of ESP and
they find the mirror at her house. We
learn that Ryuji also has some kind of ESP powers when he touches the old guy
who works at the hotels hand and sees a flashback to the demonstration where
she was supposed to show everyone her powers.
Someone calls her a fraud and then that dude dies. The chick yells out “Sadako!” and some little
creepy girl runs away. Sadako is her
daughter and has the power to just kill people (will she use it for good or
evil). The mom killed herself and no one
knows what happened to the daughter.
A big ole storm comes to town and the two barely make it off
the island with Asakawa having one day left.
They head back to the hotel and find a well under one of the buildings
just like the one at the end of the video.
Asakawa has a vision of Sadako’s dad whacking her on the head and then
dumping her in the well. Ryuji goes down
in the well and finds fingernails on the sides of the well meaning Sadako was
still alive and tried to climb out. They
spend the whole day trying to empty out the well bucket by bucket. It’s getting very near death time.
This is why your well water smells
BIG SPOILERS
They switch positions with Asakawa going down in the well
when all of a sudden she finds hair and a hand grabs her arm. Slowly Sadako comes out of the water and
Asakawa hugs her creepy skeleton. Ryuji
yells that it’s past death time and that they’ve done it! No dying for them. Everybody goes home and things seem like
they’re back to normal. Ryuji turns
around in his place and the video is on.
It shows Sadako crawling out of the well and walking towards the
camera. All of a sudden Sadako crawl out
of the TV. He see’s her eye, makes the
face and dies all while on the phone with Asakawa.
Now Asakawa is all worried about her kid dying. Now she is wondering what she did to keep her
alive. She looks at her TV and in the reflection
sees Ryuji pointing to her purse, which has a copy of the video she made. Asakawa comes to the conclusion that if you
make a copy and show it to someone else, then you pass it on to him or her. You can make a chain that goes on forever or
end it by showing it to someone who wants to or is ready to die (her old
dad). The end with weird club music.
READ ALONG
Favorite Scene: The big scare.
Memorable Lines: “Ryuji? When it's time for me to die...
Stay with me.”
Rating: 7.1 Kit Kat bars. This is a far superior movie to Ju-on in
suspense, cinematography and just general story telling. The acting and writing is so-so but it’s
paced well and the tone just feels like a horror movie should.
Alternate Ending: That kid was creepy
and I want him to get it.
What I would do if I were the main
character: Be too scared of the possibility of dying to watch the video. Also too dumb to believe it’s real. So I guess I’m saying live.
What happens in the sequel: The
American Ring 2 is total garbage. The
Japanese on is pretty cool and goes into more about the Sadako’s mom. Will do next year probably.
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