Ring Ø: Birthday

When I was sitting there watching the first film I just couldn’t stop wondering why that spooky walking evil eye ghost well girl was the way that she was, I sure am glad this movie pulled the curtain back and explained it all to me, there’s nothing worse than leaving something shrouded in mystery, who wants that, yuck. Sometimes we don’t want to peak behind the curtain.

What was so scary about the first Ringu was the mystery. True, for most of that first film all they did was try to dispel that mystery through rational explanation, god knows why. Still, there was enough spookiness in there to withstand the trivialization inflicted by the main character's investigation. The prequel seems bent on totally obliterating whatever enigma Sadako had left in her, ruining the series completely.

Birthday is a surprisingly effective Sadako story and probably the best of all the follow-ups to the original. The tension filled story is held together well by a joyful mix of heart and tragic loss.

My favorite of the original trilogy and entire series, including the forgotten sequel and the Korean/American remakes. As with the others the writing is poor and the story is convoluted, in fact it's quite hard to explain why I prefer this to the others. "Ring 0" is just the right balance of scares and atmosphere mixed in with some emotional drama for good measure. Even though you know Sadako's eventual outcome you still find yourself caring the character.

Abysmal production value tarnishes a decent origin story...and then the actors and writing follow suit to finish it off.

I really tried to like this movie, but I just couldn't get into it or care at all about the characters. The movie is so slow and it really makes me not want to watch it. It doesn't get really interesting until the last half hour and than I just don't care. The story of Sadako could have been very interesting.

The origin story is much more tragic and compelling than the mostly dull tape stuff that comes after.

Nothing compared to the first Ringu.

Tried to watch this twice and had to switch it off within about 30mins each time. And that's not because it's scary.