Death Note

"Death Note" (2017, Adam Wingard, LP Entertainment, Vertigo Entertainment, Lin Pictures, Netflix) is an American horror film based on the Japanese Manga by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata.

Light Turner (Nat Wolff) is a high school student. He's not popular, he's not athletic and he makes cash on the side through doing others' homework. When Light comes across a mysterious notebook and meets the sinister Ryuk (Willem Dafoe), a demonic death god, his life begins to change. Quickly unlocking the secrets of the notebook's power: to kill any individual properly targeted using the book, Light finds a kindred spirit in his crush, Mia (Margaret Qualley), and also attracts the unwanted attention of L (Lakeith Stanfield) , an FBI agent seeking to halt their murderous spree.

Although Light's original intentions may have been good, things become complicated and messy as time progresses and he becomes suspicious that Ryuk may not be on his side after all. The overall taking from this film is the old adage: 'power corrupts'.

The film offers some good qualities: Dafoe's performance as the creepy and charming Ryuk is very effective, and the aesthetics of the film are nicely put together. However, the film attempts to pack so much in to the run time that it feels slightly unfinished and focuses perhaps too much attention on the puppy-love aspect of the sub-plot as opposed to mysteries of the notebook or of Ryuk. The ending is also convoluted and felt unhinged from the rest of the film.

I've learned that as well as removing the story from Japan to suit a more Western audience, the film has made other changes to the plot and characters as to make this version very different from the base material. I am not much of a Manga reader, but I feel intrigued now to search "Death Note" out and give it a whirl, if anything to understand the base material more and perhaps seek a better appreciation for this interesting story.

[Image: Netflix]

Hani

The Forest

"The Forest" (2016, Jason Zada, Al-Film, Lava Bear Productions, Focus Features, Gramercy Pictures, Icon Film Distribution) is a supernatural horror set in the infamous Aokigahara Forest, also known as "the suicide forest", in Japan.

Sara (Natalie Dormer with blonde hair) travels to Japan to seek her kind of flaky, missing identical twin sister, Jess (Natalie Dormer with brown hair). Jess was last seen going into the suicide forest and Sara feels certain that her twin is still alive.

She meets a reporter called Aiden (Taylor Kinney) who handily speaks Japanese and helps find her a 'guide' in the form of Michi (Yukiyoshi Ozawa) who will take them into the forest to look for her sister in the daylight, but not after dark. Sara is also warned several times to stay on the path. Upon finding some hope in the forest shortly before nightfall, Sara refuses to leave and Michi eventually relents, leaving her there with Aiden who decides to keep her company. But the forest is full of sorrowful and angry spirits and Sara's mental state puts her in peril. She also definitely ventures off the path.

A moody, slow film which delivers some effective jump scares but relies a little too often on tropes to maintain any kind of fear factor. The film also suffered from a patchwork feel due to its stylistic flashbacks and dream scenes. I like Natalie Dormer, but her character's descent into madness felt more like a psychotic ex turning on somebody mid-date than a spiral into sorrowful insanity. However, within the forest itself I did appreciate the atmosphere. The final few scenes felt kind of rushed, however, and the film felt overall a little hokey. Japanese horror films have a special kind of scare factor that really make them different. Simply setting a horror movie in Japan, even in somewhere so emotive as Aokigahara Forest, doesn't constitute a scary film.

Although, this girl I liked. She was my favourite thing about the film, really.

[Image: Lava Bear Productions, et al]

Hani

Shutter

"Shutter" (2008, Masayuki Ochiai, Regency Enterprises, New Recency, Vertigo Entertainment, 20th Century Fox) is an American ghost horror based in Tokyo about a haunted camera.... Kind of. It is a remake of the 2004 Thai horror film with the same name.

Ben (Joshua Jackson) and Jane (Rachael Taylor) seem  like a perfect couple at first. We see them at their wedding, smiling away. We see them coming home together - still smiling. We see them set off to live in Tokyo where Ben, a photographer, has gotten a job with some friends he used to work with in Japan before. On their travels, Jane accidentally hits a young girl in a white dress who was standing in the middle of a dark road. They wreck their car and Jane frantically hunts for the girl, but to no avail; she is gone, along with any trace of her.

With their new exciting life in Japan already off to a less than idyllic start, Jane is further disillusioned once she reaches their destination. Although their apartment is huge, Ben is working all the time. She also doesn't speak any Japanese and feels like an outsider as she wanders aimlessly around the city and when she gets home she is surrounded by beautiful models and fashion entourage who make her feel even more like an outsider. Ben doesn't really notice any of this as he gets stuck back in with his friends and colleagues, getting to shoot fancy magazine pieces.

Jane is so happy when their wedding photos arrive and is dismayed to find that there is a white, ghostly mark through most of them. Confused she asks Ben, who convinces her that there was something faulty with the development and that it will be OK. But Jane is unconvinced as she goes through their honeymoon photos and even her own city snaps to find the same mark is present on all of them - and they were all taken with different cameras in different mediums...

Ben is not convinced, but Jane is adamant that the girl she struck on the road had died and is haunting them. She sets herself to uncover the mystery, but as she delves deeper she begins to regret it as things begin to make sense...

A really good jump scare horror with a dark and twisted plot and some creepy imagery. It has all of the edge and creep of a good J-horror movie, but also a few hollywood horror tropes. The girl haunting them, Megumi (Megumi Tanaka), is your average onryō vengeful spirit with a sad tale to tell, but she is perfectly realised and does not just lift all of the hallmarks from other famous J-horror ghosts. She is sadder. It is like she doesn't want to kill them, but she is compelled to. All of the cast are pretty good in their roles and the sliding of the perfect relationship into this hellish nightmare is captured well.

While it's nothing novel the film is effective in a Saturday night movie kind of way and has a couple of scary moments that I appreciated. I really want to see the Thai version now as it is bound to be much, much scarier!

[Image: 20th Century Fox, et al[

Hani

One Missed Call (2004)

"One Missed Call" (2004, Takashi Miike, Kadokawa-Daiei) is the Japanese original horror which was then remade by an American company in 2008.

Unlike "The Grudge", where the American remake is almost on par with the Japanese version, "One Missed Call"'s remake was of a much lesser quality.

If you can withstand the subtitles, the 2004 version is really, very creepy.

The premise of the film is that you recieve a call on your mobile phone (or cell phone for all you non-British folk). The phone doesn't ring with your usual ringtone (instead with a creepy little tune) and will ring regardless of whether the phone is off, broken or without a battery. No matter whether you try to answer or not, you always miss the call, and have to fetch a voicemail message.

The voicemail is always set in the future, is from your own number and features the last sounds you make/hear before dying painfully. There's also always a candy sweet in each victim's mouth..., granted sometimes their mouths are quite far away from the rest of their bodies by the time the candy is found...

Creepy stuff!

Now, like "The Grudge" and "The Ring", "One Missed Call"'s ghost girl kills in a domino effect, beginning with Yoko (Anna Nagata) and then working through her phone book...

It's up to Yumi (Kou Shibasaki), Yoko's best friend to try to stop the curse before it's too late for herself! But in order to stop the ghost, she has to follow the clues to the ghosts' beginnings and face some other spectres from the dead girls' past.

But can she convince the angry spirit to stop with the murder? One can only hope.

Nicely gorey with some disturbingly creepy scenes and it may put you off MMS messages for life!

Japanese ghost horror is always a winner with me as it's always creepy, but I sometimes find the differences in culture make it hard to follow. But a shit-scared person staring into the gruesome eyes of death, is a shit-scared person staring into the gruesome eyes of death in every culture, so the importants parts of the film are easy to follow.

I must also admit to jumping nowadays if my phone has an episode and randomly changes its ringtone from a Black Stone Cherry song to one of the preset ringers; Mimiko's gonna get you!

[Picture: Kadokawa-Daiei]

Hani

The Grudge

"The Grudge" (2004, Takashi Shimizu, Columbia Pictures, Ghost House Pictures) is the American remake of the Japanese original from all the way back in, check this, 2003.

Now the Japanese version is terrifying! And the American version is too. This was my first viewing of the American one, and I have to admit to some jumping.

Similar to "The Ring" and "One Missed Call", two other excellent Japanese horror stories, the plot is based around a terrible death in a house in Japan, a curse and a Chinese-whispers-esque/domino effect resulting in the inevitable pile of corpses.

True to the style of the Japanese original, the remake of "The Grudge" keeps the terrifying can-come-out-of-anywhere ghost with straggly hair (an onryō ghost, Wikipedia tells me). Usually, seeing all ruins the effect, but this film is truly haunting, even if it does show you all the details.

I'm a Sarah Michelle Gellar fan, so naturally I was pleased with her performance as care worker Karen. And it's always nice to see Ted Raimi.

The child ghost Toshio (Yuya Ozeki) is absolutely terrifying in a very sad way. And naturally Kayako (Takako Fuji) is the stuff of nightmares as the vengeful female ghost.

The special effects are awesome and will keep you on the edge of your seat. While I prefer the Japanese original, this remake did everything right. Scary stuff!

[Picture: Ghost House Pictures]

Hani