 |
||
In Praise of Japanese Ghosts -- and Creepy Kids
by Des Nnochiri, July 3rd, 2008
I've got a Ring thing going. No, not a jewellery fetish. A managed obsession: with the films of the Japanese "Ringu" cycle, and their American counterparts. I have screensavers, sound clips, desktop wallpapers, website analysis - you name it.
I came to the phenomenon quite recently. About six months ago, I picked up a DVD with "The Ring" (US, 2002), and "The Ring Two" (US, 2005) on it. I sat and watched both films, back to back.
They scared me. And I haven't been scared by a horror movie, for an awfully long time. Not since Clive Barker's original "Hellraiser" (1987), in fact.
I immediately went out and bought DVDs of the Japanese films ("Ringu"; 1998, "Rasen"; 1998, "Ringu 2"; 1999, and "Ringu 0"; 2000 ) that inspired the American versions. I watched them and concluded that disturbing, psychologically-based horrors have the edge over limb-hacking, "in yer face" viscerals, every time.
And that - in this case - the US remakes actually have the edge over the Japanese originals.
For those of you who haven't seen the films, a summary of the basic premise.
"The Ring" opens in the home of teenage schoolgirl Katie Embry (played by Amber Tamblyn), who is watching TV with her friend Becca (Rachael Bella). Conversation turns to the rumor of a cursed videotape, which kills you seven days after you watch it. Katie reveals that she actually watched the tape herself, in the company of three other kids. Seven days ago.
Katie duly dies - quite horribly - and the action switches to single mom Rachel Keller (played by Naomi Watts), and her young son Aidan (David Dorfman). Rachel is an investigative journalist - and an aunt of the dead Katie Embry.
At Katie's funeral, Rachel's sister Ruth (Lindsay Frost) asks her to investigate her daughter's death. She does, and uncovers references to the cursed video. To the fact that the three other kids who watched it with Katie all died on the same night - at the same hour. And that they had all stayed at the same vacation lodge in rural Washington State.
Rachel travels up there, books a room, and proceeds to find and watch the cursed tape. The video consists of eerie sounds, and apparently unrelated but disturbing black and white images. It begins with a jagged ring of light, and is punctuated by the activities of a mysterious dark-haired woman. It ends with the telephone in Rachel's room ringing. A child's voice whispers "Seven days", when Rachel answers.
Back home, Rachel makes a copy of the tape, and gives it to video technician Noah Clay (biological father of Aidan, played by Martin Henderson). She continues her own investigations, all the while experiencing weird phenomena directly related to images on the cursed tape.
Rachel's research leads her to Moesko Island (in Washington State, near the vacation lodge), and events in the life of local horse breeder Richard Morgan (Brian Cox). These culminated in the untimely death of his wife Anna (the mysterious woman in the video, played by Shannon Cochran).
The stakes rise considerably when Rachel's son Aidan accidentally watches the cursed videotape. With the clock now ticking down on both of them, Aidan asks the all-important question: "Who is she, Rachel?"
Wise boy.
In "The Ring", Aidan Keller is presented to us as a Creepy Kid of the "Sixth Sense" kind. Preternaturally adult, psychically receptive, pale - but engaging enough, over all. He is also the only one of the principal players with useful insight into the activities of the Creepy Kid at the heart of all the murderous mayhem.
One of the images on the cursed videotape shows a reflection in the oval mirror in the Morgan's house. A little figure in a white dress, with long, untidy black hair completely obscuring its face.
Samara Morgan (played by Daveigh Chase). Adopted daughter of Richard and Anna.
Known as Sadako Yamamura (Inou Rie) in the Japanese "Ringu" film.
One of the most terrifyingly original movie monsters of recent years.
Not so original, though. Both girls are contemporary reworkings of the onryõ - a ghost from Japanese traditional folklore. An onryõ is able to pass in and out of the limbo between our own world and the afterlife, to avenge wrongs committed while the vengeful spirit was alive. Most are female, with whatever strengths they may have possessed in life greatly magnified in (un)death.
The "Ring" girls expired in similar circumstances: brutally assaulted by an exasperated parent, tossed down an open well, and left for dead. They didn't die - at least, not immediately. It took a while longer. Seven days, in fact.
Though this happened some time ago (the 1960s in Sadako's case; the late '70s for Samara), neither girl is happy about it. To this day.
In addition to their circumstances and physical appearance, Sadako and Samara share a common trait: the rare psychic gift of projected thermography. This is the ability to burn images from the mind onto the surfaces of solid objects, onto recording media (such as videotapes), and into the minds of other living things. Not nice images, either. Horrible, nightmarish, "fledgling serial killer" type images.
Both the American and Japanese films gloss over this ability to some extent. Where the US franchise rises above the original material is in choosing to give the audience more information as to what happened when Samara was a little girl.
And in allowing us to see her face.
It has been said that monsters aren't born, but made. The human ones, anyway.
The turning point of "The Ring" comes with Rachel Keller's viewing of a therapy video shot while Samara Morgan was an inmate of the Eola Psychiatric Hospital, in Washington. Richard Morgan had the girl committed, when it became clear that she couldn't (or wouldn't) control her psychic abilities. The constant stream of images from her mind had become unbearable to those around her.
It's a deceptive scene. It's meant to be.
On the face of it, we have a frightened and unhappy little girl, sleep-deprived, in a place of confinement. Zonked out on tranquillizers, and unable to control her powers.
That's what Rachel, and the hapless therapist see.
What they don't realize is what we're actually seeing is a powerful, vindictive little monster. Mistreated by those she'd expected to care for her. Zonked out on tranquillizers, and telling the simple truth.
THERAPIST
You don't want to hurt anyone..?
SAMARA
But, I do.
And I'm sorry... It won't stop.
Incidentally, a scene was deleted from the US theatrical release, that would have given the game away much sooner.
As the therapy video goes on, Samara reveals the unsatisfactory state of her relationship with her adoptive father.
SAMARA
He wants me to go away.
THERAPIST
No he doesn't.
SAMARA
But, he doesn't know...
THERAPIST
He doesn't know what?
Samara..?
At which point, the therapy tape fades to static, and is snatched from the machine by an irate Richard Morgan, interrupting Rachel's viewing.
In the deleted scene, the video continues, as follows:
THERAPIST
He doesn't know what?
SAMARA
(harsh whisper)
Everyone will suffer.
Indeed.
I've heard comparisons made with Anthony Hopkins' pivotal scenes at the asylum, as Hannibal Lecter in "The Silence of the Lambs." The analogy is a good one, and I'd caution the producers of the US "Ring" franchise to bear in mind that Daveigh Chase's excellent performance as Samara in the first film was largely responsible for the overall success of the series. If other "Ring" movies are in the works, they'd be wise to involve her, in some way.
Which brings us to "The Ring Two."
The "Ringu" cycle in Japan has spawned three sequels (so far). "Rasen" (1998) passed the whole "cursed video / 7-day death" phenomenon off as a virus. "Ringu 2" (1999) saw Rachel Keller's Japanese counterpart Reiko take her son Yoichi into hiding, after he began to exhibit strange powers. "Ringu 0" (2000) took us back 30 years, to find the origins of Sadako Yamamura.
Each film suffers to some extent from the Horror Franchise Law of Diminishing Returns. The same can be said of the American series.
Where "The Ring" gave us mystery, mounting suspense, and an effects sequence widely hailed as one of the scariest moments ever committed to film (I won't spoil it for you. But it gives "Reality TV" a whole new meaning), "The Ring Two" hits us with special effects from the outset. Some scenes are more successful than others.
A bathroom full of water, streaming upwards: Okay.
Samara's ghost, expelled as an inky cloud in a bathtub: Pretty darn cool.
The Attack of the CGI Killer Deer: We could have done without.
And no Daveigh.
The makers of "The Ring Two" reduce Samara Morgan to a supernatural presence - a bogey woman, rather than a character. She's played by Kelly Stables, the physical actor credited as Evil Samara, in the first film.
With Daveigh Chase seen only briefly in archive footage, it's left to David Dorfman (returning as Aidan Keller) to give reference to Samara as a personality. Since the plot revolves around Samara's attempt to come back to life by possessing Aidan's body, he has plenty of opportunity to do this.
And he does - with some style. His changes in posture, syntax, and speech patterns are subtle, but highly effective. Heck, any kid who can make the words, "Thank you, Max" and "I love you, Mommy" sound positively chilling (as Dorfman does), has got my vote.
It'll certainly make you think twice about what really goes on in the mind of any child who can sit catatonically in front of The Cartoon Network, for hours on end.
I hear rumors of a third installment to the American "Ring" franchise. Initial reports speak of a change in direction. Perhaps a prequel, detailing the events leading up to Samara Morgan's death.
I hope that lessons will have been learned from the Japanese "prequel" that was "Ringu 0." This was a bizarro tale that revealed Sadako Yamamura to be not one person, but two. One is an apparently normal young woman, the other an eternal child, with the trademark powers of projected thermography. This made for some interesting visuals. But a narrative mishmash, overall.
If the next "Ring" movie is a prequel, I've one fairly obvious casting suggestion: Daveigh Chase, as Samara's teenage birth-mother, Evelyn (played in middle age by Sissy Spacek, in "The Ring Two"). It's logical, and would retain some continuity in the series. Should they opt for a variant on the "Big Samara-Little Samara" theme of "Ringu 0", half the casting problem would be solved there, too.
Naturally, there are some approaches I hope they won't adopt (Samara's death video goes YouTube, and Blu-Ray DVD!!). Whatever happens - assuming the film becomes a reality - I'll be there.
If only to see if they can scare me again.