Summary:
A social assistant discovers a vengeful spirit waiting at the house where she is assigned.
My Thoughts:
In the early 2000, I feel as if the horror genre saw an influx of great Asian cinema; “Ringu”, “Dark Water”, “Pulse”, “One Missed Call”, and this film were all popular enough in America to receive (crappy) American remakes. In a way, that’s pretty impressive: it really speaks volumes to the originality in Asian horror if we (Americans) are forced to look to them for something we haven’t seen before. On the other hand, I honestly don’t think all of the horror flicks we (again, Americans) remade were that great to begin with, quality wise they were sort of all over the place. Over the years I feel like I’ve seen quite a few versions of these flicks, both the original versions and the remakes, and my reaction to them, like their quality, varied greatly.
I remember “Dark Water” being kind of cool; “Ringu” is pretty good (and, surprisingly, so is “Ring”, the American remake); “One Missed Call” kinda sucked... “Juon: the Grudge” was a film I was pretty unfamiliar with, though I had seen the remake, “The Grudge”, thanks, in large part, to Sarah Michelle Gellar’s involvement and my ongoing obsession with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. As far as what I knew about the Japanese original, there was not much. I knew there was a creepy looking little boy and a lady with a bunch of floaty hair, and that was about it. So, when my roommate suggested we check this flick out, I though, sure, why not, what the heck?
As a whole, I feel like “Juon: The Grudge” is what many of the movies that came out around the early 2000s from that region were: the film provides a few creepy, atmospheric moments and a few genuinely creepy images. Do I think this film succeeds in being a great ghost story with some horrific sequences? Not really. For the most part this movie is a slow gradual steeping into a deeply unsettled atmosphere, but for true horror fans, sometimes, that’s exactly what we need. There were just enough disturbing images and compelling moments of unfolding backstory to keep me engaged through the meager runtime.
I like the weird storytelling structure that this film implemented. There are a few different storylines that sort of all weave together to form this horrific tapestry, and our protagonist sort of meanders, dreamlike, through all of them. The way the story just falls into another storyline worked in a pretty cool way, and from a storytelling perspective, that’s probably the most impressive part of the film.
If I’m being honest, as a whole, I think that “Ju-on” is fine, but it’s by no means “must see cinema”, even when you’re comparing it to other Asian horror flicks. “Ju-On” largely feels competently made, but it fails to reach the level of atmosphere or straight up horror provided in films like “The Wailing”, “A Tale of Two Sisters”, or “I Saw the Devil”. “Ju-On” is fine; really, I think it got popular because of that creepy little kid (he does look creepy!). That image is subtle and shocking- it looks like innocence corrupted, and that, in essence, is sort of what horror is all about.
I learned after my viewing of this film that “Ju-on The Grudge” is actually the third film in the “Ju-on” series; the first two films were straight to DVD (and there were also two short films which took place in the same universe), but those films were popular enough to warrant the production of this film, which, it sounds like, implemented certain plotlines from the previous films. Just from my perspective, you don’t really need to see the first two entries if you want to watch this film; the movie made enough sense as is.
Verdict:
I feel like I’m just going to keep saying this, but this movie is fine. There are one or two moments where I found myself saying, “Oh, that’s actually pretty darn creepy!” but there were also moments where I found my eyes sliding slowly towards my phone, looking for some distraction. If you have a true interest in foreign horror, I can guarantee you’ll probably like this more than the average American viewer, but you certainly don’t need to go out of your way to see this flick. It’s fine.
Review Written By: