A Invocação

"The Ring" ("Ringu") was groundbreaking and innovative back in its time, and the following movies - read parts 2 and 0, as well as the Korean version, but not the American version (which was just beyond awful) - were great. And in the spirit of the previous Japanese movies, I was thrilled when I happened to fall across "Sadako 3D" by sheer luck. Preparing for a good old fashioned Japanese scarefest, I settled in on the couch to watch "Sadako 3D".

And now that the end credits have finished, I sit here with a very, very empty feeling and a rather bad taste in my mouth. This movie was quite far from the original trilogy, both in plot and in scares. Not to mention the 3D effects were not particularly impressive.

For a Japanese horror movie then "Sadako 3D" was frightfully lacking spooks and scary moments. And a poorly animated CGI version of Sadako didn't really help the movie along in any great way. Nor did it help when she came out of the well and had strangely mutated legs. Or when there were several of those creatures crawling around. It was just horrible to witness.

The acting throughout the movie was adequate, despite the actor and actresses had very little to work with. And Satomi Ishihara (playing Akane) did carry the movie all by herself actually. Without her in the movie, it would have been even more gut-wrenching to sit through.

At 96 minutes, you get very little worth for your money. The movie is lacking that tradition dark sense of foreboding doom and horror that usually permeates the Japanese horror movies. "Sadako 3D" was too much of a re-shined attempt to cash in on an otherwise great series and try to brighten it up with 3D effects.

Having seen "Sadako 3D", I am somewhat hesitant about sitting down to watch "Sadako 2 3D". Why? Well, aside from the lack of creativity in the title, then from the fear that it will turn out just as dull, lifeless and boring as the first "Sadako" movie was.

"Sadako 3D" is more of a slap in the face of fans of the original "Ring" movies than it is a well-worthy addition to the legacy.

Set-up. Set-up. Sudden jump-scare!

Arbitrary poor character establishment scene.

Set-up. Set-up. Sudden dopey, gimmicky 3D jump-scare!

Boring, cliché plot-exposition scene.

Set-up. Set-up. Cheesy creature effect jump-scare!

Nonsensical filler fluff scene.

Set-up. Set-up. Another laughable 3D jump-scare that looks silly when viewed in 2D!

...that pretty much sums up "Sadako 3D', the 2012 film from director Tsutomu Hanabusa. Essentially an attempt to revive the much-beloved "Ringu" (aka "Ring") franchise in the modern internet age, this stinker is pretty much a dead-on-arrival thriller that is more likely to induce unintentional giggles and an occasional yawn than inspire chills in audiences.

I was actually fairly excited to hear this film was being released. I'm an enormous fan of master-director Hideo Nakata's original film, and I even enjoyed the various sequels, prequels and remakes to an extent. (Though I have sadly thus far been unable to read the original Koji Suzuki novels that inspired those films.) The prospect of a more modern take on the "Ring" mythos was intriguing... and to be honest, I didn't have a problem with the idea of the film being in 3D. Some of the iconography and famous images of the franchise would frankly lend itself well the added depth provided by modern 3D technology.

But alas, it wasn't to be. Director Hanabusa trades in the wonderful sense of pervasive dread that the original film oozed to make room for nonstop, effects-heavy scares that come off as wonky and funny due to the overly-gimmicky nature of the 3D. And it's all made even worse by the fact that... it's kinda hard to find a 3D copy of the film, meaning the obvious obligatory "3D Comin' at ya!" effects look all the cheaper and lazier when viewed in 2D.

The plot is a messy, forgettable affair. And I'm not joking. I watched the film about a year ago, and I couldn't really tell you what happened looking back on it. Something about a video released online that drives people to commit suicide, and an evil plot to resurrect the spirit of the dreaded Sadako. But trying to recollect specifics of the plot... it's just a blur of nonsensical imagery and flat characterizations. The prior films would stick with you. Even after a single viewing, you could vividly recall every major detail of the plot. Every twist of the story. Every single eerie moment. But this film leaves as little impact as the viral videos it seems to be drawing inspiration from. Like every supposedly "big" YouTube clip you've seen... you'll forget it within days once the "next big thing" comes along.

Although to give credit where it is due, there are a couple of stand- out moments. Including a fairly accomplished sequence involving a slew of genuinely disturbing spider-like "Sadakos" in a pretty suspenseful little sequence that makes good use of body-horror imagery. While it didn't contribute much to grand scheme of the film, it was a pretty zany, creepy sequence, and horror-fans who are disturbed by things like the alteration or unnatural changes of the human form should get a kick out of it.

But outside from that and a couple other moments that work, this is otherwise an enormous mess. The constant jumps get predictable to the point you'll be giggling in anticipation, and the plot is a thin excuse for nothing but special effect after special effect. And the fact it appears to have the production values of a low-budget TV-movie doesn't exactly help.

It's odd. I've been wanting to review this for some time now. But I could never quite put together the words to describe it. And I realized that's the big problem for me... there just isn't much to say about it. It's an underwhelming follow-up/light-reboot that adds nothing to the "Ring" franchise, outside of stylistic betrayals of the prior films.

And that's about it.

I'm giving "Sadako 3D" a weak 3 out of 10. It's not the worst horror film ever made. But it's a shocking fall from grace given how good the franchise was in its prime.

Being a big fan of the Japanese originals as well as the American remakes, I'm always in for more of this franchise it seems. That being said, I'll be the first to admit that this movie is extremely far removed from its source material. Both the books and the movies. It is just completely bonkers, in a way that only a Japanese movie can be, being such a bizarre mix of a seriously attempted plot and obviously ridiculous things, that you constantly keep wondering what you're actually looking at. If you're in the right mood, that can be very entertaining.

This movie is many things. Silly, bizarre, creative, over the top, but never boring. It takes the basic concept of Sadako and that's about it. Yes, there is a cursed video, but gone is the 7 days requirement and all the suspense it brings. Gone is her backstory as well. This Sadako doesn't follow many rules, and has as many faces and forms as all the other movies in the franchise combined. Some of them were so crazy I just had to respect the creativity of it. I mean, wow. It's a lot. Most of it wasn't actually scary, but certainly memorable.

This movie really makes me see Sadako (2019) in a different light. I think the original director returned just to remind people that Sadako 3D is not what the franchise is about. 2019 had some silly aspects, but Sadako 3D makes it look almost gritty and realistic with its utter ridiculousness, almost like an attempt at 'return to form'. It shows just how far a franchise can derail if it runs long enough.

If you want a serious suspenseful horror film like the original Ringu, nothing to see here. Me personally, I'm used to seeing long running franchises go completely off the rails (Alien and Godzilla come to mind), so seeing an interation of Sadako this crazy isn't all that surprising. Go in with an open mind, and you might have fun with it.

Back when the world was first introduced to the creepy long-haired girl in white that came after a viewing of a cursed videotape, the goggle box in the living room was probably the only device one needed to fear. Today, the invasion of the electronic screen into every nook and cranny of our lives is so pervasive that we'd probably be staring at fear itself no matter where we turn- and it is precisely this reality that 'Sadako 3D', the fifth official entry in the 'Ring' series, exploits.

In one of the more effective sequences of the movie, our protagonist Akane (Ishihara Satomi) flees the all-girls school she is teaching at to get away from the multitude of computer screens within, only to be confronted on the street by electronic billboards above and around her. It is a clever reflection of the world we live in today, dominated by second, third and fourth screens of different sizes and dimensions. Speaking of dimension, an additional dimension of fear has also been added in the form of depth, another phenomenon that 'Sadako 3D' gladly takes advantage of.

Yet despite these virtues, director Hanabusa Tsutomo's adaptation of original creator Koji Suzuki's newest addition to the series is a hugely disappointing entry that sullies the reputation of the franchise. Instead of the grippingly eerie atmosphere of Hideo Nakata's first film, we get cheap 'boo' scares that dissipate as quickly as they appear. Instead of a genuinely spine-tingling central character in Sadako, we get a young teenage girl with superimposed red eyes and inexplicably numerous spider-like 'Sadakos' that end up unintentionally amusing. And instead of some intriguing village folklore surrounding Sadako, we get some lame excuse in the form of a limp revenge plot concocted by a vengeful artist.

Yes, Tsumoto's 'Sadako 3D' is such a deeply flawed movie that one can't help but lament at the caricature the central character has become at the hands of a clearly inept director. Tsumoto was also behind the screenplay and he and co-writer Fujioka Yoshinobu are just as incompetent in sustaining any dramatic momentum in the storytelling. Despite hewing closely to the template of the original movie in having a female protagonist on the hunt for Sadako, the duo fail to replicate the former's riveting buildup of fear or dread, chiefly because Akane isn't given much of a mystery to decipher in the first place. Couple that with a haphazard manner by which various supporting characters chance upon the said cursed footage and meet their death, and you have a narrative that basically makes little sense.

But none of that compares to the appalling CGI employed for Sadako. It says a lot when the Sadako of fourteen years ago looks more realistic than the Sadako here- and that is apparent right from the opening shot with a woman falling down a well. Even if we are willing to overlook the perspective issues of this oft-repeated shot, the use of CGI in Sadako's appearance from a computer screen or smartphone is simply awful, driven solely from the perspective of the third dimension with little thought of other spatial considerations.

Most dreadful- and worthy of reiterating- is the laugh-inducing climax where tens of Sadako-wannabes go after Akane in pure arachnid fashion. For no other reason other than the fact that it must have been hard crawling out of smaller modern-day screens, our supposedly fear-inducing character has suddenly been reduced to a long-legged creature monster that moves with extraordinary speed. Not only that, Akane also makes the transformation from scared schoolteacher to spider-buster, vanquishing her pursuers with a simple wield of a metal rod. Humour was probably not Tsumoto's intention for this drawn-out ending, but there's little else it offers.

Regrettably then, this seemingly prescient entry into the 'Ring' mythology is a complete letdown. Instead of offering a new dimension in horror, it careens into unintentional humour and just about erases any lasting memory of why Sadako was so terrifying in the first place. Like most franchise entries with '3D' prominently displayed within its title, it is no more than a cash-grab attempt at exploiting the extra dimension with a lame rehash of a previously successful horror that did just fine in 2D. With such a feeble return, this Sadako might as well have stayed in the well- which is where you want to kick it under after you've seen it.

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From the original Ringu series that is. It might try to come up with something fresh and original, but it doesn't really succeed. The main actress is really beautiful and she may be able to act, but it's not like she has to in this movie. Many people will also have issues with CGI, but it's not about the CGI itself, but the fact that it is poor CGI, added to make the 3D thing "work".

I only watched the 2D version, but it's crystal clear, where the 3D is supposed to kick in. Even the version I watched is "comin' at you"! But that does not warrant watching this movie. At least not on my watch. But somehow they seem to have managed to make enough money to actually be able to do a sequel to this (according to IMDb) ... I'm not holding my breath (sorry for the pun).