The Ring Virus
23/10/11
The Ring Virus
RING VIRUS – DVD Movie
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YU-GI-OH! 1st ED. x3 CARDS=TRIBE SHOCKING VIRUS=SILVER RARE PHSW-EN034
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So-so Korean version is worth a look,
The South Korean version of the Ring, titled Ring Virus for US distribution, more or less follows the Japanese original. There are the expected name changes of characters, but there are a few instances where elements of Koji Suzuki’s original novel pop up that didn’t appear in even Ringu. One of them involves why “Sadako” was killed, another involves her brief career in show business.
Yes, there is a journalist whose niece died from mysterious circumstances. This time, she’s Hong Sun-Ju, and she is a single mother, but with a young daughter, Boram. Sun-Ju investigates the death of Sang-Mi and as it turns out, her friends, Kyung-Ah, who paged Sang-Mi before her own demise, and Chang, who was on the phone with Sang-Mi before she died. The coroner’s verdict is cardiac arrest, yet Sun-Ju wonders “Why would you grab your own hair during a heart attack?” She gets some help from her colleague Kim, who’d rather go out with her. He does investigate the whereabouts of Park Eun Suh, the Sadako of this version.
Eventually, she traces things to a resort where there is a video in a plain white case, and which she watches. So who does she work with? Her partner is Dr. Choi, a quirky coroner who relies more on gut instinct rather than concrete evidence. He believes Kyung-Ah and her boyfriend died from some supernatural shock rather than some virus from a recent meteor shower. “You’re playing a dangerous game, Sun-Ju. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen,” he warns her. His laidback nonchalance gets on Sun-Ju’s nerves, especially as when they search for information, he insists she does something, reminding her that she has less time than he does. He’s so flippant he tells her “why don’t you show the video to lots of people? You’ll have plenty of helpers on your hands.” Yet he sees this as “a game of life and death” and professes to a certain curiosity. Yet later, when things look hopeless, he says the only thing that scares him is dying before solving what he considers a third-rate riddle. The interesting difference is that there is no previous association between Choi and Sun-Ju as there was between Reiko and Ryuji in Ringu. And the supernatural element is caught on earlier by Choi
The familiar things in Ringu, such as the distorted photographs, ghostly apparition coming out of the TV set, the dialect, investigation into the paranormal, the trip off the mainland, and flashbacks to the past are all there. The cursed video isn’t that creepy, but the differentiation between abstract images and those that are more concrete is a dynamic from Suzuki’s novel that gets a mention here. Another thing from the novel played out here is that it’s the four teenagers who spitefully erased the curse’s solution that was on the video after the images, presumably to scare the next people watching it. If their selfish perverseness was the reason, then they definitely deserved to die.
The only other unique thing other than having a young daughter (Boram) is the idea of a hermaphrodite exemplifying feminine beauty and masculine strength in the age where cloning has been introduced. This is from an artist Sun-Ju interviews at the beginning. Later, Choi reintroduces that idea in reference to Eun Suh’s medical condition, then ties that in with this: “we only know parts of reality, but we can’t know the beginning or the end. That’s life.”
While not a bad rendition, Ring Virus suffers primarily in its female lead character, Hong Sun-Ju. She’s a bit of a cold fish here, not at all personable, and one doesn’t care whether she lives or dies. At least the characters of her little daughter and Choi are more fun. And some of the subtitles are introduced out of sync with the dialogue. Other than that, worth a look as a comparative study with the far superior Ringu.
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|Comment by Daniel J. Hamlow — October 23, 2011 @ 1:20 pm
Sickly “Virus”,
Believe it or not, Gore Verbinski’s “The Ring” wasn’t the first remake of the hit horror movie. A few years before that, a Korean remake of the original Japanese film was undertaken, but “Ring Virus” lacks a cohesive script, dramatic tension or semi-realistic characters.
Journalist Hong Sun-Ju (Eun-Kyung Shin) learns her young niece and her pals have died mysteriously — the official report is that they all had heart attacks, but Sun-Ju notices that the girl was tearing out her hair. The one similarity is a videotape full of odd images, which Sun-Ju watches. At the end is a warning that she will die in seven days, if she doesn’t follow the following instructions. Too bad some idiot taped over those instructions.
After what has happened to her niece, Sun-Ju is freaked out. She seeks the help of the quirky coroner Dr. Chin (Jin-yeong Jeong), who supports the curse theory of the videotape. The two of them explore the sinister past of a Korean island, a famous psychic, and the mysterious young girl Eun-suh (Du-na Bae) who is the key to the curse.
Yeah, it sounds pretty similar to both “Ringu” and “The Ring,” and it does have the same basic plot. There are a few differences, like Sun-Ju having a daughter, but in essence it’s the same plot. Except, of course, that the movie surrounding that plot is a stinker.
The thing that kills “Ring Virus” is director Dong-bin Kim. His direction is choppy and often lifts scenes from the far superior Hideo Nakata — which basically means that comparisons are inevitable. He doesn’t know how to make the movie creepy and tense, or to take advantage of the suspenseful moments, like the face hidden in Eun-suh’s hair.
Eun-Kyung Shin does a passable job, but she seems too passive; Jin-yeong Jeong has a fun character, and he plays up the quirkiness well, but he sticks out like a sore thumb. Especially since his entire reason for being in the film (besides being a love interest) is to make wild leaps in logic, and telling the audience information that he can’t possibly have figured out on his own.
The most disastrous character is Eun-suh, the ghoulgirl who made the curse in the first place. The entire plot essentially revolves around her scheming, evil personality. Turning her into a mopey teenager — complete with flashbacks — rather than someone who has become utterly evil essentially destroys the whole idea of the cursed videotape.
“Ring Virus” has one or two interesting things going for it, but the stumbling direction and terrible Eun-suh are enough to sink it. This is one virus that should be medicated away.
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|Comment by E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" — October 23, 2011 @ 2:12 pm
Confusing… But Interested,
Let me get this straight — MOST people reviewing this are talking about the Japanese version, which they shouldn’t. This is the KOREAN REMAKE OF THE ORIGINAL JAPANESE VERSION. Oy. Anyway, the Korean remake is slightly confusing — it’s almost as if they expected you to have already watched the original Japanese version. The acting is very stale. Very, very stale. The two main characters are often in conflict with each other, even when they shouldn’t be. Their portrayl of Eun-Suh (Sadako, Samara, in other versions) is rather interesting. Rather than hiding her face completely, she is portrayed as a feminine figure. Hmm. Go figure. I’d recommend this to fans of the Japanese version only, unless you’re in a good mood and want to try something new.
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|Comment by Anna — October 23, 2011 @ 2:41 pm