Review(s): DVD The Ring Two (Unrated Widescreen Edition)
Of course, not as good as the first....
i knew this wasn't guna be as good as the first. From what reviews and friends and everyone was saying about it, I was upset because i thought it would be terrible. I have been looking forward to this movie for a long time and recently saw it. It was much better and scarier than everyone had said. I wastched it in my basement, at night, while i heard noises upstairs, so that made it creepier. I thought the story wasn't that bad either. I don't know what people were thinking. I could understand it not being their favorite movie, but it actually was not bad at all.
unnecessary sequel
Having loved the first movie, an arty and consistently gripping chiller, I was looking forward to the new one. Unfortunately, "Ring 2" is a picture-perfect case of sequelitis - unnecessary and unoriginal.
THE PLOT: In the last movie, we learnt that anybody who watches a mysterious, cursed videotape dies after seven days - their faces frozen in a twisted grimace of terror. Skeptical, reporter Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts) tracks the tape down, and becomes one of the victims - forcing her to discover the secret behind the tape. Piecing the tape's enigmatic images together, Rachel journeyed to a remote island, and linked the tape to a seriously disturbed girl named Samara. Samara's mother - who appears on the tape - has already committed suicide by then. There were hints of a darker crime surrounding Samara, who was institutionalized, and never slept. By the end of the last movie, we learned that Samara was the evil that pervaded everything and, rather than save her, Rachel has unwittingly unleashed her. The only way Rachel could save herself and Aidan, her dark-mannered son, was to make a copy of the tape and pass it on.
The new movie picks up a few years later. Rachel and Aidan have relocated to a small coastal town where the cursed tape makes a reappearance. Hoping to stop Samara, Rachel intercepts the tape and destroys it. But Samara has somehow evolved past the need for the tape, and is soon beginning to terrorize Rachel by possessing Aidan. Now Rachel must again search for Samara's secrets.
Again? What's the point? "Ring 2" junks everything that made the first movie so much dark fun including the "deadline" and (for the most part) the cursed tape itself. The deadline always reminded us that the movie was leading to a climax, while the tape gave the terror a point of focus (you could only die if you watched it; your only hope was to piece together its weird clues). In "Ring 2", stuff just happens whether or not you've seen the tape, so what's the point. Also, the shocks themselves are pointless - they don't move anybody in any direction, unlike those of the first flick which served as additional clues or at least signs. Lastly, the film also overdoes-it on special effects at the expense of characters. The first movie was refreshingly spare in the FX department - saving most for the surprise unhappy ending - instead relying on measured shocks from its atmospheric cinematography and from the fact that nobody really knew what direction the movie was going. The new movie goes in pretty much the same direction, but with more CGI and less atmosphere. Even Samara is diminished - the movie having lost Daveigh Chase who was great as the poor little girl out to scare the world to death. Instead, pop your copy of the first movie into your DVD and forget they ever followed it up.
Not as scary the second time around
The conclusion of the surprise 2002 hit horror film The Ring was not a happy one, especially for whoever was unlucky enough to watch the copied deadly videotape Rachel (Naomi Watts) left on the shelves of a downtown Seattle Video Ezy. With her son Aidan (David Dorfman) she drove away to start a new life, but like a bad movie you can't get out of your head, the horror follows them to deal with some unfinished business. The malevolent spirit named Samara resurfaces and Aidan might have been possessed.
The Ring stuck close to Ringu, the original Japanese masterpiece it was based on. This film was quiet and dreamily nightmarish, terrifying in its use of visual metaphors. The most telling example been how looking up out of the well, its half-opened well lid resembled a ring-shape eclipse of light. The horror of the original was more in your imagination, then in your face.
Intending to stick to a good thing, the producers of Ring 2 brought over form Japan Ringu's director Hideo Nakata for his debut US feature film. The result is still the same stylized use of imagery, and a few strong supporting performances, such as from Elizabeth Perkins as concerned Children Services doctor and Sissy Spacek, who as Samara's mother is chilling, in spite of only having the barest bones of a role to work with.
The resulting horror of Ring 2 is similar enough to that in the first movie that its fans may be left neither scared nor surprised. There is so much water used, it quickly looses any impact or meaning. The more screen time Samara is given, the less scary she becomes. Her victims die in the same way as in the first film, but now none of their characters have been developed enough for you care if they live or die.
The reviews of Ring 2 seem to be divided fifty fifty between those who love or hate it. There are fragments of the film I really liked, and you will come away remembering, but overall this squeal was a disappointment.
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