First of all, I'm Japanese/American, so there is no language barrier when I watch this; I watch both American/Japanese films.
I watched this with my expectations low, and it was what it was...
This movie seems like it took every cliché in the book and included it in this film.
Clearly the movie is trying to copy the movie "Seven", "Saw", "Scream" (frog mask), "Oldboy"
It's just nowhere near the level of the movie "Seven" or "Oldboy". The production value seems high, but the film's flow is quite bad and messy.
There's just many cheesy moments like the suspect is nearby, runs away, stays around again, dumb car chases (Hollywood influence.... oh, this film is surprisingly produced by Warner Bros), sappy flashbacks...
The villain honestly is not scary and his motives are not interesting. The frog mask guy just comes up really goofier than scary.
The movie just always takes the typical cliché easy-way-out than what could have been more shocking and interesting.
The final ending abrupt "twist", where they tried to make it seem smart, but it's a bit of a corny ambiguous ending.
Well, this film is better than Kiyoshi Kurosawa's "Creepy" film.
I agree with the other review, they tried to make it more like a cheesy action blockbuster than a more intellectual suspenseful movie.
A normal looking guy being the villain would be much scarier than an over- the-top goofy clown.