The tyranist's thoughts
I've been curious about this one since I first heard about it. Unfortunately, I live in a place where movies like this never arrive. Granted this hasn't even been released officially in the U.S. yet, but there should still be a way. When Rish and I managed to get together in his much more cosmopolitan locale, we promptly found a copy of this one and plugged it in. After all, we wouldn't want to see the American remake first if we could help it.
There's this videotape that features a lot of unusual footage and brings with it a curse. Whoever watches the tape receives a phone call and then dies seven days later. A journalist decides she must get to the bottom of things and watches the tape. The clock starts.
I found this to be one of the creepiest movies I've seen in a very long time. The video is disturbing and the plot intense. The acting was good and the script (even subtitled) was pretty good. Most of the movie features that strange Jimmy Cameron blue light and there was one scene that sort of came out of nowhere in the end, but really this one is a must see. Unless having to read the dialogue bothers you. In that case, you may want to wait until they've dubbed it.
Note: this is the first Japanese movie we've reviewed, but if they are all like this, I promise you'll see a lot more.
Posted: September 3rd, 2002

Rish Outfield's reviews
First things first, tyranist: JIMMY Cameron?
Second things second: What a wonderful premise for a movie. Now, I don’t know if the film was based on the urban legend that’s been going around, or if the urban legend came after the movie, but is something to think about. What if you had in your possession a copy of The Videotape? Would you be afraid? Would you be tempted to watch it? Would you simply dismiss it all? Would you dare to tempt fate?
Plus, there's the great tag at the end of the film, a cute and rather bleak solution to the problem that offers its own moral quandries.
It’s no surprise that the film (so successful in Japan that it spawned sequels, ripoffs, and a prequel) has been remade here in America, and imitated in Fear.com.. I had heard of Ring, aka Ringu for years, and the fact that it wasn’t domestically available made it all the more mysterious and interesting. Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy the film all that much, but there’s no faulting the story.
As the man said, this was our first Japanese-language film on the site. But I’ve never claimed to be an intellectual, and I have to admit that the language barrier was a detriment to me. Indeed, I’m sorry to say that I was fighting drowsiness at the onset, and finally gave in to sleep at what was probably the scariest part of the film. I won't let it happen again.
Best Scare: The way the ghost-creature moved was nut-shrinkingly evil. And the thing with the weird eyes (those aren’t typical Asian eyes, are they?) on the cover is really disturbing.