Filed under: Horror | Tags: Asian Horror, Death Water, j-horror, Japanese Cinema, Japanese Horror, Kiyoshi Yamamoto, Mizuchi, review
Mizuchi – AKA Death Water
Release Date: 27 May 2006 (Japan)
Director: Kiyoshi Yamamoto
Genre: Horror
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A supernatural plague has infected Tokyo’s water supply and a wave of unusual suicides, where victims cut out their own eyes, is sweeping the area. After a college professor is found dead with a note that reads “death water” clutched in his hand, Journalist Kyoko Togakure is compelled to investigate.
Death Water is – in a word – unexpected. What begins as a simple horror story about water infected with some other-worldy curse, somewhere along the line becomes a more abstract and melancholy exploration of dementia. A mature, complex story, capable acting and some genuinely entertaining surprises separate Mizuchi from the chaff of Asian horror.
The best of modern Japanese cinema often features non-linear narratives and open-ended, avant-garde approaches to story telling. Death Water does the same, with a well grounded plot and chronological progression of events, making it complex but very watchable. We can sit back and let the film take us where it takes us, without having to look at the road map every ten minutes.
There is little trace of the slapped together, childish concepts and execution we’re so accustomed to seeing in modern horror. This is a film that takes its audience seriously, something preciously rare in the genre.
Both the male and female leads, played by Haruka Igawa and Atsuro Watabe respectively, put in very solid performances. The surrounding cast contribute satisfactory work as well.
There is a noticeable lack, at times, of the sudden shocks and jolts which help comprise the core repertoire of Japanese horror. The tension and mystery however, are dialed up to appropriately high levels to compensate.
For all its creepy atmosphere and its twists and turns, Mizuchi, in the end, isn’t all that scary. It may leave you feeling hopeless, insignificant and in doubt of your own life as you knew it – but you won’t need to leave a light on at night. Death Water is a fine, dark film but if you’re looking for an hour and a half of heart attacks, you won’t find it here.
This film is a well told tale of supernatural mystery and madness which should appease anyone looking for horror that takes the art of storytelling seriously. It’s a still a wonder why paint-by-numbers movies such as Chakushin ari gain widespread notoriety, while a more bold and complex production like Mizuchi remains relatively hidden for the discovery.
7.5/10
Filed under: Horror | Tags: Ai Maeda, Asian Horror, Hanako, j-horror, school mystery, Shinsei Toire no Hanako-san, Yukihiko Tsutsumi
Shinsei Toire no Hanako-san
Release Date: 4 June 1998 (Japan)
Director: Yukihiko Tsutsumi
Genre: Horror
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Local legend has it that if you see Hanako, the girl who haunts the second floor school bathroom, you die. Our heroine Satomi and her friend, Kanae, learn the hard way that there’s more than a grain of truth to this urban legend and embark on a paranormal investigation that takes them 11 years in the past.
The film is the final in a loose series of 90s J-Horror movies revolving around the legend of Hanako. However it also functions perfectly well as a stand alone feature.
Shinsei Toire no Hanako-san is in some ways a by-the-books 90s Asian horror film, trotting out all the cheap scares you’d expect from the haunted school motif. However, the film’s first half manages to exceed expectations, presenting a compelling mystery and some well strung tension. The tale takes a turn at roughly the half way point, changing from an intriguing if typical modern Japanese ghost story, to an over-the-top paranormal adventure film.
We start off with that same old scenario; school girls falling prey to an evil ghost who haunts the grounds at night. Our protagonist, Satomi, has a terrifying experience with the spirit and joins a kind of paranormal club at school with whom she begins to explore the legend of Hanako deeper.
The simple special effects and less than seasoned actors are charming at times and the solid story development of the first half trumps most production short comings and cries of “b-movie!”
For a while, Shinsei Toire no Hanako-san does everything right. Tension is high, knowledge is low and simple but effective cinematography creates that unnatural, dark feeling central to all horror. A handful of subtleties and unanswered questions keep things fresh and provides some depth to an otherwise simple story.
Much like the Korean Whispering Corridors, there’s nothing distinctly unique about this schoolgirl horror story, it’s just done particularly well.
Unfortunately, the second half of the film fails to retain the mystery and suspense of its counterpart. Away goes the unknown fear and unsettling, creepy atmosphere, and in comes the psychics and portals to other dimensions. Trashy, cheap thrills and quickly paced scenes replace the tense eeriness of the first 50 minutes.
Without the mystery element present earlier in the film, the malevolent presence of Hanako is not enough to hold it together for another 40 minutes. The plot focus, and even cinematographic style, change noticeably at this point, as if the director suddenly took an extended lunch break and the coffee boy took over.
The result is a final quarter which explains nothing (despite being the final film in the series) and will have you glancing between clock and screen every five minutes in the hopes that the credits start rolling soon.
In spite of the lack-luster second half, Shinsei Toire no Hanako-san is still a barely worthwhile film, if only for the first 50 minutes.
6.5/10
Filed under: Horror | Tags: anthology, Asian Horror, collection, crevices, dark tales of japan, Horror, japanese horror anthology
Dark Tales of Japan (TV)
Release Date: 22 September 2004 (Japan)
Directors: Multiple
Genre: Horror
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Dark Tales of Japan is a made for tv anthology of five short horror films by five different directors. While at rare times mysterious and innovative, the anthology does not achieve the level of horror the reviewer was hoping for and on the whole, is a failure.
Perhaps the major success of this collection are bookend segments that introduce and close the anthology. A bus travels along a lonely road on a moonless night, stopping to pick up a strange old woman dressed in classical Japanese attire. Something about her seems amiss as she takes a seat near the driver and asks “would you like to hear a scary tale”? Thus begins the first of the five shorts.
There are three such segments in the anthology, the intro, a middle, and an end. They function well as a set up to the shorts and greatly help to put one in “the mood”. Unfortunately, the tales themselves fail to produce the same effect.
The Spiderwoman
In this almost comedic story, the urban legend of a spiderwoman who attacks and eats people turns out to be true. A tabloid reporter sets off in search of answers and winds up face to face with this bizzare creature.
The very premise of this tale – a woman half human, half spider who transforms at night - is difficult to take seriously. Poor computer graphics and intentionally humorous scenes don’t help. The acting isn’t half bad and admittedly there are a few surprises along the way. However, the silly premise and completely mediocre execution fall well short of horror.
Crevices
This second short is one of the briefest, and by far the best. In a small apartment in Tokyo, the spectre of dead woman is appearing between every crack, every shadow, every crevice in the house – not matter how small. Her bony white fingers appear between window frame and wall, or emerge from an open drawer barely large enough to fit a hand. A man tries frantically to protect himself by covering up every crevice with red electrical tape, which seems to hold the ghost in check.
This short film is extremely effective as a narrative and in its actual execution. No needless details given, no time wasted. The mystery of the woman and the red tape is never explained to the audience, just as it’s a complete mystery to the man in the apartment. The acting is above par for television. The ending is a hopeless, violent one – a must for this genre of horror. This is the only short in the anthology that succeeds in generating actual fear and mystery.
The Sacrafice
Mayu, a woman from a rural town, moves to the big city but is “cursed” by her boss for rejecting his advances. She returns home to learn that her grandmother spiritually sacrificed herself years earlier to save Mayu’s mother from death. Mayu’s own mother is now seemingly prepared to do the same thing for her daughter in order to lift the curse.
The plot here borders on nonsensical. The “curse” on Mayu is never explained, nor is the reason why the manager of an accounting department is able to use dark magic. There is no actual horror present in this short movie, only unexplained cliches and a poor attempt to utilize Japan’s spiritual Shinto traditions to instill some kind of old world fear in the audiance.
Blonde Kwaidan
A Japanese man with an innocent infatuation with blondes visits California, staying in a collegue’s Beverly Hills home. The ghost of his recently deceased wife (a young blonde) haunts the home.
Blonde Kwaidan is a different take on the traditional Japanese ghost. Instead of the usual black haired Japanese woman, we have a caucasian blonde in the same role. An innovative idea, but the horror just isn’t there. For three quarters of this segment, comedy is the prevailing mood. Only at the tail end, when the blonde ghost appears, is an attempt made at scaring anyone. As a horror short, Blonde Kwaidan falls flat on its face and seems out of place in Dark Tales of Japan.
Presentiment
Fukawa is a man with a lot going on – a wife and daughter, a suicidal mistress and plans to steal millions from the insurance company for which he works. Little does he know, he’s also next in line to die.
This final tale is a drawn out sleeping pill that plays more like an after school special than a horror film. The bulk of this short takes place inside an elevator. Fukawa encounters three benign spirits which herald his coming death. The three ghosts would be more at home in Disney world than in any “dark tale” and the film spends an agonizingly long time going nowhere. Unless you’re an eight year-old, Presentiment is unlikely to worry you tonight.
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This anthology was originally made to appear on television, and that’s just what it feels like. But low budgets and mediocre acting do not excuse poor storytelling. With only one short out of five worth watching, Dark Tales of Japan should probably stay in the bargain bin and out of your dvd player.
5/10
Filed under: Horror | Tags: Asian Horror, j-horror, Japanese Cinema, Reincarnation, Rinne, Takashi Shimizu, yuka
Rinne – AKA Reincarnation
Release Date: 7 January 2006 (Japan)
Director: Takashi Shimizu
Genre: Horror
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Rinne (aka Reincarnation) could be classified in the recently emerged ‘J-Horror’ genre. By now even western audiences are familiar with this style of film’s major cliche; the Japanese ghost or “Yurei” – a long-haired, white-faced malevolent spirit, often in the form of a little girl.
Although Rinne does make use of this specific cliche and other style markers of the genre, it differs from most J-Horror movies in a few key ways and in the end, goes beyond just another post Ringu Japanese horror release.
In a plot reminiscent of “The Shinning”, the horrible murder of 11 hotel guests by a disturbed university professor is repeating itself 30 years after the fact. Although the film is most definitely horror, at times it appears as if it may mutate into a mystery, as we are led to wonder at the reason for the repetition of events and the motive for the original murder. This uncharacteristic mix of genres grants the film greater depth then it would otherwise have.
The movie does its mystery component justice by revealing important details gradually throughout its run time, rather than dumping a load of loose logic at end to wrap a poorly conceived plot. Only when the credits start rolling does the audience fully understand the twists and turns of Rinne’s well paced and not entirely predictable plot.
Rinne further marks its self apart from some of its contemporaries by losing any over-the-top gore, and tightening coherency of a complex story while retaining a potency of horror that its Hollywood counter-parts have long since lost.
That being said, this film contains some of the most tried (or perhaps tired?) and true horror tricks of the last 30 years; creepy ghost children, psychics and an evil doll. Director Takashi Shimizu simply finds new ways to use them, somehow making the old and familiar into the strange and unpredictable.
While the lead actress, “Yuka”, does a surprisingly satisfactory job in her first ever role, most of the other young actors perform amateurishly.
Although fitting securely into the Japanese Horror design, Rinne’s branching into mystery/thriller territory along with its new use of old tricks, coupled with the film’s overall quality, gently breaks the mold of the genre and makes it a film well worth the price of rental.
7/10
Filed under: Horror | Tags: Asian Horror, Chakushin ari, death calls, ghosts, j-horror, Japanese Horror, one missed call, takashi miike, yurei
Chakushin Ari – AKA One Missed Call
Released: 17 January 2004 (Japan)
Director: Takashi Miike
Genre: Horror
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Chakushin Ari is another Horror outing for notorious director Takashi Miike. In this film Takashi works with the frankly typical and played out themes of a vengeful female ghost and phantom phone calls that announce death. The execution of said J-Horror standards is above average and the actors perform well. Even so, Chakushin Ari would probably be half remembered as another mediocre early 2000s Horror flick if it were not for the director’s ability to create a half-way decent story behind the cliches and give us just a little something to think about at the conclusion of his film.
Our protagonist is a twenty-something girl named Yumi Nakamura whose friends start dropping like flies when they receive bizzare phone-calls coming from their own mobile phones and dated in the near future. Our girl teams up with the brother of a victim (Hiroshi Yamashita) to solve and stop the phenomenon before it inevitably happens to her.
The images and feelings of Horror we are presented with in Chakushin Ari are, as stated, fairly well put together but too cliche to give those of us with a passion for the genre a reason to keep the lights on at night. The now beaten to death theme of ominous phantom phone calls in particular seems to have completely lost any shock or fear value it once had. One can predict exactly how the whole scenario involving the phone calls will play out and then watch it unfold like it has a dozen times before or since, in a dozen other movies.
The Ghost, or “Yurei” doesn’t really appear until the second half, when it completely replaces the death calls as the main Horror motivating force. Most scenes involving the now famous style of white-faced, black-haired ghost are well arranged and succeed in invoking that sudden terror that was so noticeably absent from the fist half of the film. Unfortunately, we’ve seen it all before. As even the casual movie goer can tell you, the early 2000s were saturated with films capitalizing on the Ringu style Yurei.
If Chakushin Ari were to stop at the 135 minute mark, we’d have a completely forgettable film that, because of its use of two of the most overworked Horror concepts in Japan, would surely blend with its many below par peers and disappear from memory.
Thankfully, Takashi Miike reserves the last 15 minutes for his brand of quality and innovation. In those closing minutes we are presented with a slight plot twist and then a surreal few scenes where it’s nearly impossible to tell what, if anything, is real and whether it’s all good or bad for our protagonists. In stark and somewhat jarring contrast to Chakushin Ari’s predictable bulk, its closing minutes are mysterious, reflective and bear an abstract tone.
In the end, we are left to wonder about the final fate of Yumi and Hiroshi and ponder on the cryptic statement that serves as a kind of bookend for the film, “There are various skies, to everyone.” If not for this sudden and unexpected change in the film, Chakushin Ari would be a text book example of the standard and uninventive J-Horror films of its time.
6.5/10
Filed under: Horror | Tags: Asian Horror, Audition, j-horror, Japanese Cinema, japanese thriller, Odishon, takashi miike, toture
Odishon – AKA Audition
Release date: 3 March 2000 (Japan)
Director: Takashi Miike
Genre: Horror
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Audition was released just prior to the formation of what we now know as ‘J-Horror’ in the popular lexicon. The acting is excellent, the story intriguing and the suspense and horror strong. Although by now – nearly a decade after its release – Audition has lost a little of its shock value, it is still a powerful film that will send those unaccustomed to hardcore horror and gore running.
The movie follows Shigeharu Aoyama , a middle aged widower who decides he wants to remarry. With the help of his movie producer friend, he holds an “audition” for the woman he will marry. Aoyama instantly falls for a polite and reserved yet strong woman named Asami Yamazaki. There is clearly something deeply unsettling surrounding the mysterious young woman, but Aoyama is the only one not able to sense it. After Yamazaki abruptly disappears from his life, Aoyama embarks on a quest to find her. What he discovers is a horrific trail of disappearances, abuse and murders leading right up to present events.
Audition is a hybrid, being one part psychological thriller and one part Japanese cult movie. The film has been favorably compared to Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo in that it explores the realms of personal obsession, deception in relationships and hidden personalities.
The first half of the film is relatively horror free and is closer to a drama or even, I hesitate to say, a romantic comedy with regards to the ‘audition’ for Aoyama’s wife. Director Takashi Miike keeps the audience interested all the way through with a steady, never-stalling pace, and great dialogue and acting.
The following half of Audition takes on a much darker tone. Like Aoyama, we don’t know exactly what the details are regarding Yamazaki, but have a feeling there’s something very wrong at the heart of it all. Just the short glimpse into her private life we have had so far – Yamazaki huddled menacingly in a rotting apartment furnished with nothing but a phone and a burlap sack whose contents occasionally spasm in movement – is enough to give cause for fear.
Aoyama’s investigation into his would-be wife’s past life takes him to forgotten and broken down places that have been touched by evil or murder. The film quickly gets deeper and darker – focusing only on Aoyama, with events getting more surreal and nightmarish as time passes. Characters who previously held a secondary role, such as Aoyama’s son, fall away into the background and soon disappear completely.
This palpable transition from a state of midday to midnight effects the entire film, from visuals to story telling and dialogue.
The infamous torture scene near the end of the film may be a slight let down for viewers. Much fuss has been made about it, but the reality is, Japan has far surpassed its self in the field of extreme gore since 1999. Suicide Club and Battle Royal are only a few movies that come to mind as having trumped Audition in the severed limbs and buckets of blood category.
That being said, that particular scene is disturbing. And, as a matter of fact, another sequence, involving a slave-like, animalistic, maimed man at Yamazaki’s command is far more unsettling than the much talked about torture sequence. Someone not used to viewing such truly graphic violence and depravity present in both scenes will be shocked by their brutality.
The film’s pre-millenium age has its benefits. It seems to predate some of the out-of-hand, surreal and at times seemingly nonsensical tendencies of later Japanese cult movies. The plot has logic to it, with an event progression easy to follow yet still engrossing. Aside from one or two examples, the movie is both believable and plausible and thus the horror made relevant.
In the end, although Audition may not be quite as shocking as it was nine years ago, it still stands as an excellent film with powerful themes and shows us that great Japanese horror cinema need not revolve completely around little dead girls.
8.5/10
