The year 1998 saw a Japanese film which was named Ringu and as per the horror movie reviews, this was the start of the attendance of mass audience to view such movies in different countries. The Japanese Horror movies of similar nature came with subtitles and made the public demand for more. Ringu was adapted from a novel by Koji Suzuki and it was again inspired from Japanese folk tale – Bancho Sarayashiki. This film was released in United States as The Ring (English Remake though) in 2002, which again was a success. The film talks about a cursed video recording and when anyone watches it – is fated to die within a week.
The original novel was a great success in Japan, as per the horror movie reviews and Kadokawa Shoten started to think about a movie with the same story and it took nine months and a few days to create the movie. Hiroshi Takahashi and Hideo Nakata worked on the script together and came up with a budget of 1.2million USD. The special effects and some other scenes were shooted on 35mm film and then re-done in a computer laboratory to bring out the actual effects that we saw in the movie. The Japanese horror movies became highly popular among the people all over the world after this was released world wide.
The story of Ringu is very simple and the added spooky effects got all its praise from horror movie reviews. The story talks about a teenager – Tomoko, who views a videotape which was cursed and then receives a phone call. The videotape showed a woman telling her that she would die within a week and she dies, along with her other friends. One of her friend goes berserk after seeing all these and Tomoko’s aunt tries to find out how it happened. She investigates and finds about a strange video that all the friends viewed. Many Japanese horror movies that came up later took this idea of a cursed video and were successful.
The Aunt Reiko watched the video to find what it is all about and was eventually cursed, and tried to find out a way to break the curse. The critics of the horror movie reviews harped on the fact that many of the things were not explained properly but still it got a prequel and sequels to form an atmosphere which is unique and can be experienced by the people who come with a strong heart. The music of this movie helps to enhance the atmosphere of bizarre. The soundtrack was done by Krzsztof Penderecki – Polish Composer and Kenji Kawai; both famous with the Japanese horror movies.
Hideo Nakata’s original movie got its English version as ‘The Ring’ and many other sequels and single prequel of the movie. The horror movie reviews state that the movie became more popular as it is completely free of the usual macabre shots of the supernatural movies. The story idea is simple and this helps to make it more fantastic and scary and the effects of dark scenarios and soundtrack made it more blood cuddling at places. Unlike other Japanese horror movies – this has a sense of calm and a few set pieces make it more realistic and creeping, with an assumption of dread at every second.
