Powerful

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Having seen the Verbinski film first. I was not as scared as I likely would be otherwise. However, there is one advantage the Nakata film objectively has.The plot made more sense.For instance, take when the female leads learn about how Sadako/Samara ended up in the well. In the Verbinski film, we just have Rachel get a vision while looking for Samara's body. Without much explanation for how she could see a memory that wasn't her own. In the Nakata film, however, it was explained earlier that Reiko has ESP, as does Ryuji.Also, Sadako's story being less revealed than Samara's better feeds into the mystery of how the tape was made. Or for that matter, why Sadako does all the bad things she does. The lack of detail on her character also feeds into the idea of her being completely evil. Lastly, it doesn't explain who Rachel will show Aidan's copy to. (Though she does show it to a death row inmate in a deleted scene). In the Nakata film, Reiko plans to have her dad watch the tape for Yoichi's sake.In general, both are fine. But the plot of this one is much better.

The best thing about this movie is that if it had not been made the remake would not have been made. It is not scary. It is slow and boring. It has an awful story line. It has awful acting. I do not no why it got a 7.3. This movie is just overrated. I give 4 out 10. Do not see this movie. The 2002 remake is very scary. This one is just boring. Ghosts stories can be very scary if there are done well. Remakes proves that is this could have been so mush better. Do not see this movie. See the remake but do not bother with this one. People who get scared of it are easy to scary.

Ring is the only J horror I have watched to date. In general, I'm sick and tired of horror movies because they're all the same. Not this one. This nightmarish, chilling and stratospherically creepy horror movie isn't just a great horror movie, but in general a great film. The story is simple: A video tape kills people 7 days after they watch it, and a journalist tries not to become the next victim. It may sound ordinary, but I have never seen such a creepy movie in my life. Rather than jump scares and gore, the movie is filled to the brim with creepy imagery, atmospheric lighting, shiver inducing music and chilling locations. Even though there aren't many actual scares, you forget about it and are still watching through your fingers even when there's nothing going on. It is the best type of ghost story: Simple, clear and effective, and even though VHS no longer exists, it's still utterly terrifying.Without CGI or gore, the film takes normal modern technology and turns it into a living nightmare in a way no other film I've seen has done. As for that final scene, let's just say you'll never look at a TV the same way again. Some may find the film dull, which I can understand, but don't expect loads of repeated scares because you won't get them. It's endless creepy imagery, with one massive scare at the end. This might be the best horror movie of the 90s, and most modern horror films cower in its shadow. The villain, despite little screen time makes a huge dent, and the temperature in the room will drop many degrees every time she appears. A haunting and influential horror bull's eye. Comparing this to the remake is like comparing the altitudes of a plane and a submarine.10/10

There's something to be said about the strength of good, eerie, slowly- paced horror. Especially in a day and age as we are now, where horror is misinterpreted by filmmakers as loud, lazy jump-scares, buckets of gore, and nubile girls running around in next-to-nothing, fleeing from deranged murderers. There's something almost immediately admirable and exciting about a horror film that eschews these more modern (and decidedly not scary) tactics, and instead respects its audience, using atmosphere, a slowly building pace, subtlety and well-developed characters to draw us into a pervasive, overwhelming sense of dread.Think about some horror classics: John Carpenter's "Halloween" (or even more effectively, his remake "The Thing"), Hitchcock's "Psycho", Peter Medak's "The Changeling", etc. They all were respectful, subtle films that didn't rely on cheapness and laziness like so many other modern horror films. And I do believe that Hideo Nakata's "Ringu" (or "Ring"), a 1998 Japanese horror film inspired by the novels of Koji Suzuki, belongs on a list with those classics. It is a powerful film for it's quiet nature, subtle storytelling and well-developed characters, and they are what makes it so effective and frightening. (Although tragically, it's most recent sequel, "Sadako 3D" does eschew the classic, subtle storytelling for a more messy modern affair... more to come on that train-wreck in a later review.)We follow Reiko Asakawa (Nanako Matsushima), a reporter who is investigating an increasingly popular urban legend regarding an alleged "haunted video", which supposedly causes the death of all who see it. After probing the recent death of her niece, Reiko decides to retrace their last few days, and discovers a mysterious video-tape in a cabin they had rented. Realizing that the urban legend of the haunted tape is true, Reiko and her ex husband Ryugi (Hiroyuki Sanada) are forced to try and solve the mystery of who created it and how to stop it.The performances are fantastic. Matsushima as our lead is brilliant and very well-developed, and is able to show both strength as well as draw the audience's sympathy. (Plus my piggish side does have to admit she is very easy on the eyes) Sanada shows a lot of talent and intensity as Ryugi, and he is able to balance well with Matsushima with their good chemistry on-screen. And other performances, including Rikiya Ōtaka as Yoichi, the son of Reiko and Ryugi, are all very well-played and elevate the film quite a bit. It's a phenomenal cast.Nakata's direction is quite a sight to behold. It's very subtle, simplistic and direct, which actually makes it all the more unsettling. He doesn't go out of his way to highlight the horror, or present the monsters with dramatic camera angles and musical stings- scenes are staged and shot simply, and it makes every feel very real. You get a sense that anything can happen at any time, causing non-stop dread later in the film. The script by Hiroshi Takahashi is fantastic, slowly building the tension and developing the characters over the 96 minute run-time in a way that puts many other films to shame, and makes us not only care about everyone, but have a very real, human fear for their safety.The rest of the production is fantastic and very true-to-life. The set design is great, giving us a world that feels like the same one we live in. Costume design is simple, real and effective. The editing is top- notch, giving us a slow-build. And the musical score by Kenji Kawai is amazing. It's very minimal, and only comes in when it's needed, giving us an occasional spine-tingling violin shriek, or an eerie scraping of strings in the background."Ringu" is easily not only one of the best horror films to come out of Japan in the past 20 years, but it's easily one of the best horror films worldwide to be released in the past 20 years. And it's cultural impact (spawing so far four sequels in Japan, an American remake and sequel, and countless other works inspired by it) is something to behold. I do believe that 50 years from now, it will still be looked at as a fantastic accomplishment in horror filmmaking. The only thing I don't like about it is one particularly bad sound-effects choice that caused me to laugh out loud during a fairly crucial moment (A cartoonish sound that comes near the end and sticks out like a sore thumb), but even that cannot diminish the film in any way whatsoever."Ringu" gets a perfect 10. If you haven't seen it, do yourself a favor... get it, turn off the lights, and have a spooky time watching it!