Japanese Horror Movies

Imprint (2006) Review

November 9, 2013 by Eric S. Leave a Comment

Synopsis: In the 1800s, an American returns to Japan to find the prostitute he fell in love with, but instead learns of the psychical and existential horror that befell her after he left.

Quick Review: This segment of Masters of Horror was considered so violent that it wasn’t even shown on cable. While I’m not cautioning this decision, I can understand where it’s coming from.

Indeed, as usual, Takashi Miike does its best job at bringing intense shocking imagery on our screens. All of the biggest american taboos are to be found in Imprint: Incest, Child molestation, conjugal violence and extreme abortion.

Miike’s camera does not shy away from all the horror on display and when an intense torture scene that will make you cringe is not the most shocking scene in the movie, you know you’re in it for a wild ride.

It’s just a pity that Billy Drago’s performance is such an horrendous mess (one of the worst I’ve seen in a long while) and that the whole film has been made in english. Had it been in japanese and the main character played by a more competent actor , I believe the impact would have been greater.

Still, with its nightmarish imagery, violent perversions and great practical fx, Imprint will stay in your mind for a long time.

My Rating: 6.5 (would be higher if not for Billy Drago’s inept acting)

Click Here to Get Takashi Miike’s Imprint on DVD

Apartment 1303 (2007) Review

August 22, 2013 by Eric S. Leave a Comment

Synopsis: (from IMDb) A modern ghost story which turns a love hate relationship between mother and daughter into a tale of horror.

My Quick Review: I can’t believe that they actually made a remake from Apartment 1303, a subpar entry into the Japanese Horror Movie genre.

There is nothing fresh about this haunted apartment ghost story and the usual tricks are being deployed, this time with poor camera work and atrocious acting.

Except for the main actress, Noriko Nakagoshi, everybody’s acting is extremely laughable, especially in the first 15mn of the film. As for the “scares” I was unimpressed and the ending is just plain silly.

Apartment 1303 is a pale copy of far superior movies such as Ju-On and Dark Water, and it seems that the recent american remake is even worse. Bravo!

My Rating: 4/10

Director: Ataru Oikawa

Origin: Japan

Red Room (1999) Review

July 20, 2013 by Eric S. Leave a Comment

Original Title: Akai misshitsu (heya): Kindan no ôsama geemu

Synopsis: How low would you go to win a million dollars? Just how desperate are you for the cash? Desperate enough to enter the Red Room?

Quick Review: You got to give it to the japanese: they know their shit when it’s about showing weird twisted human depravity.

Red Room is a typical game of survival where the last one standing wins 10 million yen. 4 People are playing the game (a married couple on a verge of a divorce, a schoolgirl and a young business woman) and they all have their own reason to be there.

What happens during the next 65mn (average running time for japanese direct to video movie) are game/torture scenes that mix soft porn and gore (especially in the last 15mn). It is not as outrageous or bloody as some other similar movies out of japan but twisted enough to make you look forward to the next sick game.

Red Room is an extremely cheap looking movie (that makes Death Tube looks like an hollywood production) with 4 people in a room for most of the duration of the film, but this format actually works in favor of the movie’s whole atmosphere.

Thanks to its short running time, enjoyable and sometimes imaginative games (great uses of a blow-dryer and a bulb) and above average acting, I did enjoy Red Room and would definitively recommend it to fans of Japanese twisted movies and survival games.

My Rating: 6/10

Director: Daisuke Yamanouchi

Origin: Japan

Warning the trailer below is definitively NSFW and spoils most of the movie!!

Dark Water Review

June 22, 2013 by Eric S. Leave a Comment

Original Title: Honogurai mizu no soko kara

Synopsis: A mother and her 6 year old daughter move into a creepy apartment whose every surface is permeated by water. [from IMDb]

Neoli’s Review: I can’t believe Dark Water is more than a decade old–eleven years to be exact. That would make the little girl who plays Ikuko a grown-up now–about the age where her teenage version in the film visits their old watery apartment. (So technically, the real life Ikuko can now star in the sequel, but I’m digressing.)

In the hands of Hideo Nakata (Ringu) who wrote and directed Dark Water, the film takes on a slow, easy-going pace that gets creepy as you move on. There’s too much wetness going on here, which is enough to make viewers feel drenched and possibly shivering–from the rain-soaked outdoors which the little girl braves with her tiny umbrella to the waterlogged ceiling caused by the leaky apartment above them. (Maybe it was Dark Water that brought ugly water stains into classic horror imagery.) As for the American remake, we love anything Jennifer Connelly stars in, but the original is still the winner.

Anyway, Ikuko’s mom, played by the lovely Hitomi Kuroki, beautifully flits from being serene and frantic. She’s calm as she struggles to win custody of her child and raise her on her own, but in the end she unravels too as she discovers the source and reason of the mysterious leaks. The last scene of the film, the sacrifice scene in the elevator, is the most haunting of all—that look on the mother’s face—a combination of surrender, relief, joy, and regret–which has no English equivalent as yet but which the German might have–that look is unforgettable. And of course the sadness of Ikuko, now all alone in the world, is just infinite.

So this is what Japanese horror films were all about back in those days: filled with moral dilemmas and irrevocable consequences—no serial killers or school kids pitted against each other and other carnage-filled flicks. Just the simple theme of mother and daughter. Cheesy as it sounds, Dark Water is a horror film with a heart. Albeit one which will haunt you for years, even decades to come.

Neoli’s rating: 10/10

Click Here to Own and Watch Dark Water Now!

Director: Hideo Nakata

Starring: Hitomi Kuroki, Rio Kanno, Mirei Oguchi, Fumiyo Kohinata

Released: 2002

Origin: Japan

Death Tube Review

April 19, 2013 by Eric S. Leave a Comment

Titre Original: Satsujin Douga Site

Year: 2010

Director: Yôhei Fukuda

My Short Review: There are so many bad reviews of Death Tube that I was almost reluctant to watch it. Well I’m glad I did. To be faire I’m a big fan of the Saw Series and of F***ed up Japanese Movies so the story behing Death Tube was definitively tailored for an audience like myself. What rubbed a lot of people the wrong way (the cheap set, the bad acting, the bear costumes…) was, for me, part of the whole fun.

If you watch a lot of japanese game shows, you do have those funny/creepy costumed characters, funny voice over, whole people’s reactions splattered in text on the screen. Death Tube in that sense is very Japanese and very traditional in the way those types of elimination games are being played. The twist here is that, if you lose, you die, and it is being streamed live on the internet.

I did not think the acting was that bad, it’s all part of the over the top reactions found in other japanese movies or, once again, game shows. The bear costumes are really creepy and play a big role in the movie’s mood. The games are silly but interesting enough to keep you guessing. There is even an attempt at moral issues (the main character is part of the game because he did not help one of the contestant of a previous game..)

My only disappointment was within the actual deaths. I would have liked more gore or more imaginative way of killing the losers. The best kills happen early in the movies (one contestant is beheaded and another one is being drilled in the head) but for the others it is quite boring (poison, gunshots…).

Apparently a sequel was made and I have to say I can’t wait to watch it if I can get my hands on it.

My Rating: 6.5/10