Not as scary and makes less sense - heck, despite director Takashi Shimuzi being involved what did you expect?
With the torrent of US remakes of Asian films in various stages of release, production and pre-production, Takashi Shimizu got a rare chance: to direct the remake of his own movie Ju-on: The Grudge. Inadvertently seeming to set a president with the release of Hideo Nakata’s The Ring 2.
Of course, it’s not the first time a director has been given such an opportunity. In 1993, for instance, George Sluizer remade his own The Vanishing. As with that film, for a director employed on the merits of their work – producer Sam Raimi called Ju-on the scariest movie he’d ever seen - it’s astounding how many concessions have been made for the new and. let’s face it, less sophisticated audience. (That is, the Americans.) The result can help from being a watered down version of the original - reasonable performances and undoubtedly a more linear, clear plot, but none of it’s icky, unpleasant and downright scary atmosphere.
Despite using the same sets and even several of the same cast members (for the ghosts) it’s not quite the carbon copy you’d expect. With it’s basis in Japanese folk lore, it’s unsurprising that the filmmakers decided to move the Americans to Japan, rather than the story to America. The device opens up some glaring weaknesses in the plot, that the horror only seems to befall expats. Well, that might fit with American psyche right now – hell, everyone’s always getting at them – but it all seems a little too convenient. Right, Sarah’s working over there. And her boyfriend. And that family she visits. Oh, and isn’t that Sam’s brother Ted as her boss? And what about that guy who jumped out of the window at the start?
Dropping the name card device for characters about to die, and playing less with the timeline, for the main part it follows the narrative of the original. Okay, some of the scares are put in a different context. There’s even an occasional new spin, but the filmmakers really aren’t expecting their audience to have seen the original, so don’t make the effort to do little more than replicate it.
The real difference comes in the drop of the originals confusing device two-thirds through, where one of the characters sees his daughter nearly a decade into the future, then the film follows her at that age. Unsurprising really, as it was the directors rather underhanded ploy to regain momentum – even at the expense of losing the audience - for a premise that is more than a little repetitive. It recreates the effect though, by having Geller’s character see into events in the house from the past. (Hell, Bill Pullman’s gotta pay his way somehow!) The film dumps then originals revelation for a far more mainstream, predictable ’scary’ ending.
At times you feel as if Shimizu is laughing at his American benefactors expense. Unlike in the original, where several owners have lived in the house since the murders were committed, here the Western family are the first inhabitants in three years. How lucky is that estate agent to find some American tenants who know nothing of the houses past? The wife even suffers a little Lost In Translation style isolation, which is all rather irrelevant considering what’s about to happen to her.
It might not the best Asian horror by any means, but if you want a real fright then stick with the original – even if the American version makes a bit more sense.
