THE RING VIRUS

		Review by E.C.McMullen Jr.
SHOULD YOU? TIP JAR THE RING VIRUS - 1999 Omega Project / Kadokawa Shoten Publishing Company, Ltd. (Japan) / Golden Scene (Hong Kong) Ratings: Hong Kong: IIB / Singapore: PG

Like THE RING, THE RING VIRUS took the Japanese movie and remade it for Korean audiences. Sometimes you can get a fascinating insight into a culture of people by the way they retell a story. Adapting a tale for a specific audience often reveals a lot about that culture. Sometimes though, it just reveals an embarrassing amount about the people who made it. Read our SCIENCE MOMENT and UNFAIR RACIAL CLICHÉ ALERT for more on that.

THE RING VIRUS starts with just one girl, alone at home, bored. She stretches on her bed. Tries to call a friend, gets a drink, and freaks out when the phone rings. Its just some guy, you know and that's cool. But then his voice is replaced by rinky-tinky music. Then the TV comes out with loud white noise. Then the girl gets a white face.

The next scene we see is two women at an art gallery talking about how wonderful it is to be bisexual and how wonderful of the ancient greeks to be so accepting of it. I expected this to go somewhere but it doesn't. The girl at the begining was Sung-Mi is dead and at her memorial, auntie and her cute yet creepy daughter appear. After all, this story is really about Auntie Sung-Ju (Eun-Kyung Shin: A MYSTERY OF THE CUBE, UZUMAKI), who was Asakawa in the Japanese version and Rachel in the American version. Coming from 1999, the Korean version is sandwiched between the two. Like the original, Sung-Ju is a reporter, but there are definite differences here than in either the Nipponese or U.S. versions.

Instead of an ex-boyfriend/husband, Sung-Ju looks for a young yet decrepit doctor who lays on cadaver tables to sleep. He is supposed to be some kind of genius who lost it for reasons unknown. Affecting a jaded depressive world view (you know, " life sucks." that kind of thing), he takes an interest in Sung-Ju's sex life, clear out of the blue (life sucks and can I ball you?). Though offended at his intrusive rudeness, Sung-Ju still spills the beans on how long its been since she got a little somethin' somethin' (18 months! whew!). It's an odd scene and I wondered what it said about real-life interactions between men and women in South Korea. Like the earlier Gallery scene, I expected this one to go somewhere, but it didn't.

In fact, let me save you some reading and me some writing by saying that there are an awful lot of these types of scenes in THE RING VIRUS that build up to something and go nowhere. Some have chalked this up to nuanced performences and subtle storytelling, but in truth, this tale could have been told in about 45 minutes. There is nothing wrong with a subtle slow build of suspense. I'm thinking Jonathon Demme's brilliant direction in THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS. None of the other Hannibal tales since Demme's have been worth the time it took to make them. Demme stretched out entire scenes because he was leading us to a piece of the puzzle that fit with the previous pieces. Even if you didn't get the whole picture, you knew where you were going.

But not with this flick. Even the cursed video is ham-fisted. The video tells the viewer straight out that they will die unless they solve the riddle of the tape. Then it tells them the riddle of the tape! All that's left now is to find out where it came from and who the hell En-suh was. Oh, it also tries to sell you a car. I'm guessing this flick was at least partially funded by product placement as a well known brand of soft drink also makes an appearance.

Du-na Bae (SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE) plays En-suh, the Korean Sadako. When THE RING VIRUS finally meanders to the end and we discover why En-suh is killing people who watch her video (a different reason than in RINGU or THE RING), the revelation is so trite, it wasn't even worth the journey.

1 Shriek Girl.

This review copyright 2007 E.C.McMullen Jr.

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