Marc B. Wrote:I finally had the opportunity to watch Ju-On: The Grudge 2. For those of you not familiar with this series, it's a Japanese horror franchise that is considered one of the scariest films to date. The series started off with two direct-to-video movies (just titled Ju-On) which was then followed up by a theatrical release, Ju-On: The Grudge.

As with a lot of Japanese shows, the creators sort of reinvent the story as they go along. Even though the direct-to-video and movies have the same themes, the stories are completely different. The basic premise of the story is that a man murders his wife and child then suddenly dies in the street days later. The house is bought by a new couple and each in turn dies mysteriously. The reason? Ju-On of course! The spirits of the wife and child are so angry and rage filled that they want revenge for their deaths and that includes the innocent people who had nothing to do with their murders.

Ju-On has always had an interesting way of presenting itself to the audience. It's non-linear in its editing (ala Pulp Fiction) by following one character for a bit, they disappear, move on to the next character, repeat. All characters are connected, sometimes by close ties, other times by threads. One of the fun things about Ju-On is seeing how the characters know each other, no matter how trivial.

The Grudge 2 picks up after the events of the first movie. A television show is doing a special on the house where the murders occurred. After the shoot, everyone goes their seperate ways... and start being haunted by Ju-On. People die and disappear... all the same night. It is the job of the director of the show and the celebrity actresses guest hosting the show (dubbed "the horror queen") to figure out what is happening because, for one reason or another, they were not killed nor did they disappear like everyone else.

Not quite as scary as its predecessor, The Grudge 2 still packs some pretty good scares into its 90 minutes. With a good story and good cast, anyone who has seen the original will enjoy this one. If you've never seen this series it's definitely worth checking out. Just watch it with the lights off.

And see it before the Americanized remake comes out.

Kenji Asakura Wrote:You are really like Japanese horror.

Ju=curse, On=grudge...The title is scary too. I don't see Americanized remake. Did you see it?

I heard about Japanese horror movies are scarier than Hollywood horror. Is that so? Surely, present, so many Japanese horror movies remake by Hollywood. What do you think about it? I'm glad about Americans has concerned with Japanese movies.

Recently, I saw The Others . This is surprised. I think this is inspired by Japanese horror. Did you see The Others?

nijimeijer Wrote:The problem with getting to see Ju-On locally is that there's no stateside distributor--they're waiting until this summer to release it as preparation for the Sarah Michelle Gellar American version. Publicity by releasing the original (similar to their DVD release of Ringu).

I'd love to see the movies, as I've heard so much about them.

Anybody here ever see the film "Cure"? I've heard it's a great Japanese made thriller, and I'm interested. Right now, we're working our way through the "Tomie" series, which is fun. Kind of like a typical American horror film, only made in Japan, so it has that country's feel to it.

Marc B. Wrote:I did see The Others. I don't think it was financed by an American studio, only distributed. I liked it a lot even though I saw the twist an hour before it happened.

fpw Wrote:Wish the story had been less choppy with more of a throughline, but definitely worth a look.