Ghost of Mae Nak

Moving into a new house, a newlywed and her husband come under attack by a malevolent ghost that soon turns its attention to their friends, forcing her to discover the long-held secret of her return and stop the rampage from continuing.

This one turned out better than expected. One of the elements that's really impressive here is the fact that the haunting scenes are top- notch, delivering a lot of nice scenes. The opening dream opens the film strong with the initial appearance of the ghost delivers a solid shock with it's banging noises and really off-beat jump, as well as a couple of other brief ghostly visions from out-of-nowhere especially work. The appearance in the house during the walk-through is pretty nice with the unearthly noises that only he can hear, the gag with the mirror and the second dream-sequence complete with the disappearance and a brilliant gag to wrap it in, make this one a real highlight. The stand-out sequence, where the ghost attacks thieves inside a small van, is an absolutely classic using darkness mixed with the brilliant gag of flashing light intermittently to see coupled with the comeuppance of the gang at the end, which makes this so fun. The film's other supernatural action is also really enjoyable, including the two main hospital scenes. The first sequence with the levitating body in front of the priest while the others disturb the burial site is one of the better scenes in the film, as the surgeon's test where the ghost physically prevents others from interacting with the body is a great visual and comes off rather well. The action-packed finale where the race to get the ghost action resolved meshes well with the exorcism performed elsewhere, and a fun twist capped onto the end of it all makes for a rather enjoyable and exciting conclusion. Along with the fact that the ghost is actually really creepy with its faded eyes, blacked-out mouth and teeth and an eerie dark spot on its head and the great kills in here, these film's good points here are more than enough to hold up over the couple flaws to this one. One of the biggest is that this one really has a convoluted back-story that is so hard to understand, there are repeated attempts to explain it and none of them do much good. One of the biggest obstacles in that regard is that the characters in the flashback have the same names as the current protagonists even though there's no possession going on, along with the fact that it seems to wipe out the meaning of events after they happened and offer up a second, slightly different explanation for it all just makes it all the more confusing and incredibly hard to understand. There's also the flaw in here where the film's languid pacing produces a long opening at the begging as it does take a while to get going with its good scenes while there's also the rather overlong and unneeded flashback scene which just drags the film out a little longer than what it should be. These here are the film's problems.

Rated R: Graphic Violence and Language.

This film was, without a doubt, one of the creepiest, scariest films I've seen in Asian cinema--or any cinema, for that matter. It leads the viewer along a plot line that looks ho-hum and standard for any thriller but then, when you least expect it, it takes you on a ride you never saw coming. Much of the acting is just a little "over the top" which is typical in a lot of Asian horror films, but the lead actress, newcomer Pataratida Pacharawirapong was as believable, beautiful, and emotional as any actress in any horror film I've ever seen from any country. From the cinematography, I found myself also wishing to re-visit Southeast Asia and check it out more thoroughly. There were no shots of Bangkok's crowded, dirty streets or sex outlets (which are what you'll see in 99% of the films shot in Thailand) but there were a lot of culturally interesting shots. Overall, this film is a must-see for any horror fan.

OK, last night me and some friends were on our monthly Horror-night, where we usually watch 2 Asian movies and an American one. So there we were, 7 people in quite the mood I might add, with popcorn, chips and beer, therefore no matter how bad this one would turn out to be, the fact that we were together made it impossible for it to fail: BUT IT DID !!

Dear God it failed so bad! In the first 2 minutes you get a glimpse of what they call the ghost, well, the girls called it "Whaaat?" while us, the guys were more like "Well she's kinda hot, except for that hole in her forehead!". Didn't quite know how to take the film cause we knew not if it takes itself seriously or wants to be more of a dark comedy. Well turns out, that it really tried taking itself seriously which is sad actually, because it did manage to provide some good laughs but in the bad way, cause it had no intend for such a thing.

I could go on and on with the plot, character development, "over-the-top" death scenes but I would only waste your time trust me on this one. Only good thing about this movie is that the special effects reminded us all about Mario and what a great game that is. I really miss Mario! Oh wait, this comment is about the movie. OK, summary:

STAY AWAY! YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!

There are so many things that went wrong in this movie that it's hard to find any redeeming factors. This is complete garbage and a massive waste of time.

The ghost was one of the most pathetic attempts at horror I've ever seen. The special effects were cringe-worthy and the acting was over the top in a laughable attempt to make us empathize with the characters. The actors simply recited their lines, which often consisted of redundant information we heard ten times before in the movie. We hear the same lines over and over again. Apparently the scriptwriter thought we need to have the most obvious information spelled out for us, and then repeated some 100 times in case we forgot.

The story, while not horrible, was uninspired, paper-thin and full of plot holes you could see from a mile, while the plot progression and pace were mostly non-existent. Nothing ever happens in this movie except for some Final Destination inspired deaths. Characters appear and then disappear without ever knowing what happened to them or why they were in the movie at all, in an effort to increase the body count. It's nothing you've never seen before, but this takes the cake for bad execution of an average story.

The only thing that might incite some interest might be the good insight into the traditions and legends of Thai culture. The movie sure takes its time to illustrate some rituals and ceremonies, but by then you'll surely be too bored to even care.

It baffles me that people have found this movie to be more than average. I decided to watch it based on the relatively good reviews on this site, but now I must say it's among the worst movies I've seen in the Asian horror genre or Asian cinema for that matter. Avoid like the plague!

This movie essentially begins with a young man named "Mak" (Siwat Chotchaicharin) having recurring nightmares about a ghastly woman with black teeth and a black rectangular mark on her forehead coming toward him. These dreams cause him to wake up in a state of panic. So he tells his fiancé, "Nak" (Pataratida Pacharawirapong) about it and she does her best to reassure him that everything will be fine after their wedding in another week. Unfortunately, the dreams intensify immediately after they get married and buy a home. Yet, although the apparition is indeed frightening, it also takes a deadly vengeance on those who attempt to wrong either Mak or Nak. Such is the wraith's violent nature. But one day when Mak is involved in an accident, which causes him to go into a coma, things begin to take a terrible turn for the worse. Now rather than reveal any more of this movie, I will just say that this is not the original story of the ghost known as "Mae Nak" (played in this particular film by Porntip Papanai) but rather a continuation of the legend transplanted into a modern urban location. The acting was decent and the special effects were adequate enough as well. Likewise, having two attractive actresses like Karnchanit Summakul (as "Noi") along with the aforementioned Pataratida Pacharawirapong certainly didn't hurt matters either. Additionally, I liked the location of the film (Bangkok) and I thought the CD cover was quite artistic as well. However, having said all of that I must confess that there weren't very many scenes out of the ordinary which would have made this movie really stand out. In short, it was an interesting movie but nothing really special and I have rated it accordingly. Average.