31 NIGHTS OF HALLOWEEN : NIGHT 16 : RINGU

In 1999 I became aware of a video tape floating around film fans in the North East of England, the tape contained a Japanese horror flick, that people where calling Ring, ironically the film itself was about a haunted video tape and now I question whether the pirate video itself may have just been an urban legend, as I never got my paws on it. However, it wasn't long before Ring appeared on DVD and then amazing quickly on late night Channel 4. By the time I saw it, it was a phenomenon that had spawned a sequel, a follow up (based on the books sequel) and had a 3rd film in production.

A group of teens watch a video tape, only to mysteriously die 7 days later, one such teen is the niece of a local reporter, who sets out to uncover the mystery of tape and once she finds a copy and watches it, then receives a phone call that simple states "Seven Days". From there creepy and unexplained things began to happen, but when her son finds the tape and views it's contents it becomes a race against time to break the curse surrounding the haunted VHS before it's too late.

Ringu might be one of the smartest films I have ever seen, it's certainly ones those films that I enjoyed introducing people to in my youth, and it now finds itself lodged in lists of modern cinema classics and along with The Eye helped the J Horror craze storm the western world well into the early years of the 21st century. The real Beauty of the film is the questions it raises and then seemingly refuses to answer, and makes ypu glad of that, then in its final moments turns everything on its head.

It inspired a US remake which did its own thing to relative success and here and there improved on a few things, but overall the Japanese version is far superior.

See you tomorrow.

MJ