The Ring (GOD! This is a complicated franchise)

 

Channel 4’s “100 Scariest Moments” list, #6

 

 

 

The Ring

(GOD! This is a complicated franchise)

 

 

“Ringu”

(not the original, but most famous, Japanese, released in 1998)

 

One of the striking things about Fantasy and Horror and in Asian cinema, and this doesn’t apply only to Japan but several other nations with heavily-intertwined film industries and esthetics, is how matter-of-fact the uncanny is taken even though the central characters tend to live lives rooted in the modern world. In the West, at least since the waning days of Gothic fiction, the uncanny is treated as a radical violation. Commonly it was an invasion from the outside (example: Bram Stokers novel “Dracula” (1897)), and often the Villain is often a Foreigner, most often from someplace East, and violates security and rationality of a bunch of really dull modern people so badly that they require tutorials from some expert in obscure lore (like by the character Abraham Van Helsing). The industrial world and the that of primitive belief have a bright-line of demarcation between them. At the other end of the same genre, the uncanny more reflects the central protagonist’s emotional deterioration than any exterior threat, like the works of Edgar Allen Poe (his first collection of uncanny tales was published in 1839, this was expanded into the more famous, “Tales of Mystery, the Imagination and Humor” the next year).

 

In the Far East (so farther than Transylvania), with its religions that seem exotic to us Westerners (though obviously totally familiar to the people who actually live there), there seems an easier acceptance of uncanny and the conventional walking side-by-side. As this film’s director, Hideo Nakata, once stated, "This may sound too simple but Asian ghosts can stand just behind you and can stare at you and doesn't say anything, just stands and stares at the main character. And that could be scary from our point of view... Whereas western movies, in general, westerns ghosts are an evil existence and are meant to do something to the victims, they attack the victims. So that is a difference that active feeling, the aggressiveness of the apparition in the western horror movies whereas in the Asian ones it's not. But of course, there are exceptions like the Robert Wise film ‘The Haunting’ [1963] or ‘The Turn of the Screw’ [short story by Henry James first published in 1898, but he seems to be referring to the film version, ‘The Innocents’ from 1961] those movies the ghosts were just there. In fact with ‘The Haunting’ there was no ghost whatsoever in the movie, so there are some exceptions."

 

The Supernatural just seems more natural in a lot of Asian horror, and when that attitude is combined with the artifacts of the modern world, it creates whole new mythologies.

 

This was Nakata’s fourth feature-film and all the previous were in the Horror genre. He opens this one seemingly conscious of the international audience, because he borrows from America’s teen-targeted screamers. He gives us two young girls lying on a bed, watching TV, and trying to scare each other with gruesome Urban legends. But then one girl, Masami (Hitomi Sato), tells a story that sounds a lot like a weird experience that the other girl, Tomoko (Yuko Takeuchi), actually had. It concerned a cursed video tape, a sinister phone call, and the promise that those who watched the tape would die exactly seven days later.

 

For Tomoko, it is exactly seven days later.

 

(I’m unsure if the Urban Legend was invented for this film or not, but its roots are in centuries-old Japanese folklore, the tale of “Banchō Sarayashiki”)

 

Tomoko would not be the only one who dies that night, there were two other girls who watched the cursed tape with her. All suffered heart attacks, all faces twisted in terror, and it could be argued that they all died at exactly the moment in different locations.

 

It at this point that the film shifts away, and elevates itself from, from a teen-screamer to more adult concerns. We are introduced to Tomoko’s aunt, Journalist Reiko Asakawa (Nanako Matsushima), who, because of her personal interest in the case, explores the Urban Myth. She’s not ready yet to believe in the Supernatural enough to avoid doing the most obvious thing -- watching the tape herself. Once the tape is over, Asakawa catches the reflection of something in the blank TV screen. Suddenly the telephone rings, but when she picks up the receiver, there is only static.

 

She enlists the help of her ex-husband, Ryuji (Hiroyuki Sanada), a Mathematics Tutor with some AV-tech background. A nice touch is that the initial scenes between the two are believably awkward, they are bound by the fact they have a child in common but this isn’t a story about rekindling a lost love. At this point, neither is ready to accept the supernatural explanation, and both study the tape frame-by-frame.

 

Reiko: "Who did the story start with?"

 

Ryûji:"Stories like that don't start with anyone. People feel anxious and rumors start flying. Or people start hoping that things will turn out like this."

 

They diligently follow leads and discover there’s a powerful and uncanny tragedy behind the Urban Myth, and with accumulating evidence, it slowly dawns on them that they are in serious trouble. Worse, Reiko has made a tragic mistake, she left the video unsecured, and their son, Yoichi (Rikiya Otaka), has watched it. This virus of the curse has spread, and now the whole family maybe doomed.

 

I believe it was John Buchan, the mediocre author but probably the inventor of the modern thriller, who said that it was easy to create suspense, just set up a scenario with an impending threat and start the clock ticking. Here we have three clocks ticking, because each person watched the video at a different date and time. All want to live, but the first two (the only two who really understand how much trouble they are in) are overwhelmingly focused on protecting the third, the child.

 

As the rest of the tale unfolds, the video itself recedes into the background as they get closer to the reason for its existence. Then, after they believe they’ve broken the curse, the odd mechanics of the Urban Myth move to the forefront again, and our Heroes are proved wrong in ways that are as equally bewildering and horrific; solving the last riddle of the curse sets the film up for an exceptionally dark and apocalyptic finale.

 

There’s a lot of good amateur detective work, like tracing the tape to a specific island off Japan, Izu Ōshima (a real place), because Ryūji has a good ear for dialects. There they learn the tragic tale of a famous psychic Shizuko Yamamura (Masako), who, after correctly predicting the eruption of a volcano, Mount Mihara (a real volcano), is targeted of scandalous media reports that drive her to suicide by leaping into the self-same volcano.

 

Shizuko had a daughter, Sadako (Rie Inō), and it becomes clear that both Shizuko and Sadako were treated in an exploitive manner by both their family and their doctor, Heihachiro Ikuma (Daisuke Ban). Sadako was a more powerful psychic than her mother, but with no control of her power, and the rage at the abuses she endured were projected outwards in toxic PSI-energies; presumably, this is how the video tape was created.

 

I don’t think that it’s a spoiler to state that Sadako was murdered. Clues in the video tape lead Reiko and Ryūji to where the body was dumped, and they give the tragic girl a proper burial hoping to put the spirit to rest.

 

I will not say what happens next, but a lot is still to come. The film has a few big scares, which are terrific, but Nakata more interested in building dread. Sadako, first an ambiguous threat, then a tragic victim, is finally revealed for what she truly is, a Monster, and her greatest Monstrousness is not her merciless acts, but that she has become the embodiment of false hope. Despite all their efforts, Reiko and Ryūji learn that you can never beat the reaper, and if there’s a deal to be made, it comes at a high cost to your soul.

 

The plot is complex, but smoothly told (Screenwriter Hiroshi Takahashi). Characterization is strong, and despite the outrageousness of the plot, the actors mostly keep their performances low-key and the pacing is similarly restrained (note: less pleased critics claim the characters are hard to warm to and the pacing is slow).

 

It’s based on a 1991 novel by the same name by Koji Suzuki, who is referred to as “the Japanese Stephen King.” Though I’ve not read any of his work, I will say that the film conveys a rich texture of our shared reality that heightens the uncanny insurgency, one of King’s great gifts. But as grounded as the conventional part of the reality is, even those places seem just slightly off: early in the film apartments and offices (except for sloppy Ryūji home/workspace where the terrifying climax unfolds) are so pristine they seemed unlived in, while later appearing locations, associated with the island of Izu Ōshima, are cluttered, shadow-filled, and often peppered with lights that cast no real illumination (Production Designer Iwao Saitô and Cinematographer Jun'ichirô Hayashi). The color scheme contrasts muted greys and beiges in one setting with the deepest blacks and harshest whites in another. Camera angles are more likely to be high (in Horror films they are more often low). Long-shots are favored over close-ups. Tracking shots frequently employed, but sometimes the camera seems to be unable to find what it is looking for, a gesture that shouldn’t have been effective, but it is. And the sound-scape Sound Department Alessio Masi, Naolki Mitani, Yoshiya Obara, and Kenji Shibasaki) is kept mostly muted, but only to make it make it that much more jarring when a phone rings uncommonly loudly or the score suddenly stabs out a savage punctuation.

 

The music (Composer Kenji Kawai) has a metallic feel to it, appropriate given the film is about our that demonstrates how our consensual reality being distorted by technology and itself has been distorted by the uncanny. There’s a photograph in which all the faces somehow became warped, but only the faces. There’re the images of the video tape, all the creepier because of the low-resolution. When the ghost of Sadako finally appears, her apparition suggests a poorly executed video transfer, which proved to be a much-imitated effect, but most of the imitators ignored that here the effect is supported by the specifics of the story, so the imitators, going forward without that narrative support, mostly looked stupid.

 

The timing of the film was important, released only a short time before, and not known to American audiences until after, “The Blair Witch Project” (1999). Both films elevate atmosphere over violence, and both exploit low-resolution images to cultivate unease. This was a short time when horror fans believed that the era of the Slasher and OTT Gore was over, and more richly-textured Ghost-films were making a come-back.

 

Nah, not really. Yes, since then, there’s been more success among atmospheres Ghost-films consensual reality that anytime since the 1960s, the Slashers still reap in the most cash. They are, in fact, in revival. The kids who grew up on “Friday the 13^th” (1980) and its innumerable clones are now making their own films and, well, when it comes to fear, everyone loves their childhood most.

 

“Ringu” proved a phenomenon, at the time, the highest-grossing Horror film in Japanese history. It also created a franchise that is more complicated than even those coming out of Italy. I’m not sure if the below list is complete, and I must admit I’ve seen/read very little of what follows:

·      1991 the original novel.

·      1995 sequel to novel titled “Spiral.”

·      1995 “Ring: Kanzenban” a TV movie credited as being the most faithful adaptation and more a work of SF than supernatural horror.

·      1998 “Rasen” based on “Spiral,” made before but not released until the version of “The Ring” I’m discussing here.  Also, not much beloved.

·      1998 “Ringu,” this movie, based on the first novel.

·      1998 “Loop” another novel sequel.

·      1999 “The Ring Virus” a Korean remake.

·      1999 “The Ring 2” a sequel to the 1998 “Ringu” disconnected from either “Spiral” or “Loop.”

·      1999 “Birthday,” another prose sequel, this time a collection of connected short stories.

·      1999 “Ring: The Final Chapter” a TV mini-series.

·      1999 “Rasen” a sequel to “Ring: The Final Chapter” which is not based on the novel “Spiral” nor the earlier films “Rasen” or “The Ring 2.”

·       2000 “Ring 0: Birthday,” a film prequel.

·      2002 “Feardotcom,” an absolutely shameless, almost unwatchable, rip-off, that was a USA/UK/Germany/Luxembourg co-production and managed to get into theatres just ahead of the official USA remake.

·      2002 “Ring,” USA remake of the 1992 “Ringu” and discussed below.

·      2005 “Ring 2,” a sequel to the USA “Ring.”

·      2005 “Rings,” a short-film, another sequel to the USA “Ring.”

·      2012 “Sadako 3D” back in Japan, this is a sequel to the sequel “Rasen,” though I’m not sure which of the two versions of “Rasen.”

·      2012 a new “Ring” novel titled “Tide.”

·      2013 “Sadako 3D2,” the third sequel following one of the “Rasen” lines of the franchise.

·      2017 “Rings,” depending on how you count, the third or fourth film in the USA line of the franchise.

 

By the way, I skipped the manga, amines, and radio plays, toys and god-knows what else.

 

This movie changed Japanese cinema, and eventually USA cinema as well. In quick succession there were a string of stylistically similar films, creating a sub-genre that was a counter-point to the increasingly popular Asian Extreme (examples: “Tetsuo: The Iron Man” (1989) and “Audition” (1999)), though the two sub-genres were often lumped together by international marketers.

 

One thing I’ve noticed about “Ringu,” and most of the best Asian Ghost films that followed, was that these supernatural thrillers are often driven by a central female Character who is both strong and weak in equal measures, examples: “Ju-On: The Grudge” (2000), “Pulse” (2001). “The Eye,” “Dark Water” (both 2002), “Dark Water” also Directed by Nakata), and “Shutter” (both 2004).

 

All of these had USA remakes, and interestingly, and the quality of the remakes could generally be predicted without seeing the film, solely on the strength of the lead actress. (Just for the record, the American versions of “The Ring” (2002), “Dark Water” (2002) and “Shutter” (2008) are worth your time, but ignore all the rest.)

 

 

“The Ring”

(USA remake, 2002)

 

It’s a very faithful remake, maybe because so many drafts of the script were rejected and filming began before there was a final approved script, leaving the Director Gore Verbinski had to rely on the Takahashi’s original. Writer Ehren Kruger got the on-screen credit (and won a Bram Stoker Award for it), but apparently an uncredited Scott Frank did much of the final work. It’s remarkable that in that faithfulness, the feel is significantly different.

 

The success of this film inspired a crop of USA remakes of Asian Ghost movies, but this remains the most respected, and not without reason, though I personally prefer the USA version of “Shutter,” surprisingly stronger than the powerful but flawed original because it cleaned up the messy narrative line. “The Ring,” working from stronger source material in the first place, and as a result, though effective and honorable, it’s not the original’s equal.

 

Dreamworks deserves credit for not suppressing the distribution of the original (the Weinstein Company and Dimension Films did just that with the risible American remake of “Pulse,” and because of that, the original, my favorite of these Asian Ghost films, is still mostly unknown on this continent). Dreamworks seemed to be encouraging a side-by-side comparison, a risky marketing movie that indicated their faith in the product.

 

The most significant difference between “Ringu” and “The Ring” is that the better American budget allowed for greater polish, though in most cases this greater polish was applied to meticulous recreation of the original’s excellent set-pieces. Though both film’s end the story the same way, the Japanese original implies a greater, expanding apocalyptic threat while the remake keeps things closer to the plagued central family (Reiko, Ryūji and Yoichi, have become the Kellers: Racheal, Noah and Aidan, played by Naomi Watts, Martin Henderson and David Dorfman respectively). In general, Asian Ghost films are more apocalyptic than USA ones.

 

One thing that does really distinguish the American version is though Nanako Matsushima demonstrated herself to be a gifted actress (she’s very popular in Japan), Naomi Watts even better in the same role.

 

Director Verbinski’s credits are more diverse, and his successes earned far more money, than Japan’s Nakata. The story is now set in the Pacific Northwest, and the constant threat of rain is exploited to establish the mood (Cinematographer by Bojan Bazelli), while in the original weather is only exploited for emotional effect in the film’s final frames. Long-shots remain heavily relied of, but close-ups are more prominent in the remake. The color scheme is similarly stylized, but shifting towards greenish tones. The Editing (by Craig Wood) is crisper. On the other hand, and even though I’m a fan of Composer Hans Zimmer, I prefer the original’s score.

 

The USA version also some more complicated shots, often dependent on fairly high-tech video-editing techniques, while the Japanese version relied more on stationary cameras and smooth, simple, pans. I have to say I like the simpler approach better, just as a liked the Japanese’s reliance on practical effects (Sadako’s climatic appearance not-withstanding) over CGI because I felt it held the audience in the reality of the film better (Japanese FX Hajime Matsumoto, USA FX is provided by a list of too many names to record here).

 

Key differences between the two are related to my earlier statements of Asian horrors are more casually accepted. Even when the audience changes during international distribution, this still translates into more trust by the filmmakers in that audience to understand the story on their own. The USA version is twenty-minutes longer, with elements of the original that were passed over quickly being fleshed-out into significant sub-plots (the most notable was making the little boy creepily paranormal) and adding more jump-shocks. Though some were powerful (there’s a stunning scene with a horse on a ferry) some were laughable (both films made great use of the Monster’s long black hair as fore-shadowing of the Horror to come, but when Racheal coughed up a sorta hair-ball, that was a bit much). Almost all the added material was exposition. This created a strange situation where the tighter Editing sometimes made the USA version faster-paced, but that was competing with story-padding that made it somewhat cumbersome.

 

Japanese version trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTtz7g2tiuI

 

USA version trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV3YhFDBFZ8