Review of The Ring (2002) by Dawdlingpoet — 25 Nov 2021

I'd like to start off by saying that this is one of those movies that I watched purely based on a curiosity factor (I just made that up lol). Its a movie along the same lines as the Blair Witch Project, whereby people talked about it quite alot and it got hyped up, the story sounded intriguing and so you wanted to watch it and decide for yourself whether it was as good as the hype indicated. I was aware that this movie is an American remake of a popular Asian (I think Japanese) movie, similar to movies such as The Grudge which was also originally an Asian movie which became very popular and America took note of this and chose to try and remake it into a movie to suit Western audiences. I have to say that I'm aware that such movies as these, which are often labelled as being horror movies, don't tend to 'go down' too well with me personally but yet that aforementioned 'curiosity factor' tends to get to me in the end and I'll end up watching these movies anyway as the premise interests me enough to see what its all about, so to speak. I remember being particularly dissapointed with The Blair Witch Project, with its ending making me want to shout 'is that it?!' at the TV screen at the time but I'm happy to say that I feel that this movie was slightly better, although I can't say that I was overly keen on the ending.

Unlike The Blair Witch Project, The Ring doesn't entirely rely on your mind conjuring up your own images of 'the boogie man' who you somehow know is there but yet cannot see, in this movie said 'boogie man' is actually a young girl with long black hair, whom you can barely see her face and little is known about her for some time into the movie. However, similar to said other movie, this movie doesn't feature a great amount of action scenes, of true horror material I'd say and I would, to an extent, dispute the label it seems to have been given as being a horror movie, instead I'd say its more a sort of a mix of a psychological thriller and even a partial ghost story. There are definitely scenes that will make some people jump and there is indeed a smattering of moderate violence and unsettling images, mainly in the footage on the infamous tape which is shown in the movie, so I wouldn't say that its not at all scary, although I didn't feel scared personally, it was more...unsettling I think is the word. For example, there is one very brief scene in 'the tape' whereby you can see that somebody's finger is about to be impaled on a nail - lovely(!) unsettling and makes you flinch but not really scary as such. It should probably be said that there are other scenes further into the movie which are more likely to make you jump but its mainly spooky and unsettling rather than being at all gory.

I found the movie pretty engrossing, although I found myself surprised by the plot to an exent. The story wasn't quite what I expected, with the emphasis being on Rachel trying to identify and trace the locations that appear on 'the tape' thus hoping to unravel the mystery behind its origins, which does, slowly but surely, happen but in a way its a shame as it becomes more human in a sense (does that make sense?) and there aren't too many real 'shock factor' scenes in the middle of the movie, as the mystery unravels, by that point in the movie its more like a crime thriller than it is a horror movie really and I found myself struggling a bit to fully grasp the plot turns, particularly in the final scene, which is rather gimmicky and I felt was a bit of a let down, although I would say that overall this, to me, was a better movie than The Blair Witch Project, I felt it was more entertaining and engrossing overall but it certainly wasn't without its 'quirks' shall I say. To summarise, I'd say that this isn't the worst movie of its type, certainly that I've seen, yet at the same time it has its issues - its engrossing but a little confusing and a bit slow moving, plot wise, mid way through. Some people would probably be a bit disappointed in the lack of scares roughly, again, mid way through the movie but on the other hand, I never felt compelled to switch it off and I felt like even though it has flaws, its still entertaining and somewhat intriguing somehow.

I can't deny that I still found it rather engrossing and I suppose entertaining while watching it and I'm sure people who are perhaps more keen on such movies will find a few scenes that will 'creep them out'. I feel that this isn't the worst movie of its type, though its not for me it probably will be enjoyed more by others, so I suppose I'd cautiously recommend it.