| Ring | |||||
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_Japanese_theatrical_poster.jpg) Japanese theatrical release poster | |||||
| Japanese name | |||||
| Katakana | リング | ||||
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| Directed by | Hideo Nakata | ||||
| Screenplay by | Hiroshi Takahashi[1] | ||||
| Based on | Ring byKoji Suzuki | ||||
| Produced by |
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| Starring | |||||
| Cinematography | Junichiro Hayashi[2] | ||||
| Edited by | Nobuyuki Takahashi[1] | ||||
| Music by | Kenji Kawai[1] | ||||
Production company | Ringu/Rasen Production Committee[1] | ||||
| Distributed by | Toho | ||||
Release date |
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Running time | 95 minutes[1] | ||||
| Country | Japan | ||||
| Language | Japanese | ||||
| Budget | $1.5 million[3] | ||||
| Box office | $19.5 million (est.) | ||||
Ring (リング,Ringu) is a 1998 Japanesesupernaturalpsychological horror film directed byHideo Nakata and written by Hiroshi Takahashi, based on the1991 novel byKoji Suzuki. The film starsNanako Matsushima,Miki Nakatani, andHiroyuki Sanada, and follows a reporter who is racing to investigate the mystery behind a cursedvideo tape; whoever watches the tape dies seven days after doing so. The film is also titledThe Ring (stylized asthe Ring) in Japan and was released in North America asRingu.
Production took approximately nine months, and the film was shot back-to-back with a sequel,Spiral, featuring much of the same cast but involving neither Nakata or Takahashi; both films were released together in Japan on January 31, 1998, with the studio hoping for the popularity of the novel to make both films successful.[4] After its release,Ring was a box office hit in Japan and internationally and was acclaimed by critics, who praised its atmosphere, slow-paced horror and themes.
Spawning a popularfranchise, the film has been highly influential, triggering both a western popularization ofJapanese horror, including with its own English-language adaptations starting with 2002'sThe Ring, and a renaissance of Japanese horror films, inspiring other successful franchises such asJu-On andThe Grudge and spearheading Hollywood's horror films' transition fromslashers into more atmospheric films in the 2000s. Despite the success of the original film,Spiral was largely ignored upon release, leading to Nakata and Takahashi makingRing 2 (1999), another sequel ignoring the events ofSpiral.
During a sleepover, high schoolers Tomoko and Masami discuss an urban legend about avideotape that curses its viewers to die in seven days after a foreboding phone call. Tomoko then confesses that last week, she and her friends watched a strange videotape and received an inexplicable phone call. The phone rings, startling them, but it is an innocuous call. While Masami goes to the bathroom, Tomoko witnesses the TV turn on by itself and is killed by someone or something unseen.
Reiko Asakawa, Tomoko's aunt and a journalist investigating this urban legend, attends her funeral and learns that three of Tomoko's friends who watched the tape with her all died at the same time and presumably in the same way she did. Reiko finds an unmarked videotape in a resort cabin where the four stayed. It contains brief, seemingly unrelated scenes accompanied by screeching sounds, and ends with a shot of an eerie scene of a well. After watching, Reiko sees an apparition and receives a phone call on which she hears the screeching sounds from the tape. Convinced she has been cursed, Reiko takes the tape and leaves the cabin.
Reiko enlists the help of her psychic ex-husbandRyūji Takayama. Examining a copy of the tape that Reiko made, the pair find a cryptic message spoken in anŌshima dialect, and prepare to go to Ōshima. Before departing, Reiko catchesYōichi, her son with Ryūji, watching the tape after being peer pressured by "Tomoko."
In Ōshima, Reiko and Ryūji learn about Shizuko Yamamura, the woman on the tape. Before her suicide, Shizuko gained notoriety following a public demonstration of her psychic ability organized byESP researcher Dr. Heihachiro Ikuma, with whom she had an affair. When confronting Shizuko's cousin Takashi, they learn through a vision that during the demonstration, Shizuko's young daughterSadako psychically killed a journalist who decried Shizuko's abilities. After failing to track down Sadako, Reiko realizes that Ryūji never received a phone call after watching the tape, as she did at the cabin in Izu. They rush back to the cabin.
Reiko and Ryūji find a sealed well in the cabin's crawlspace. Through another vision, they learn that Dr. Ikuma trapped Sadako inside the well. They conclude that Sadako remained alive and that the curse was born when a videotape "recorded"the rage she had projected. They drain the water and find Sadako's remains. At the end of Reiko's seven-day deadline, she remains alive, leading them to believe the curse is broken.
The next day, Ryūji's TV turns on by itself, showing the well at the end of the tape. Sadako'svengeful spirit staggers from the well and out of the TV, advancing toward Ryūji until it kills him. Reiko, trying to call Ryūji, hears his last moments over the phone. Guided by an apparition, Reiko realizes she has unwittingly found out how to survive the curse: copy the tape and show it to someone else within seven days. Desperate to save Yōichi, Reiko drives to her father's home to show him the tape.
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Critics have discussedRing's preoccupations with Japanese tradition's collision withmodernity. Colette Balmain identifies: "In the figure of Sadako,Ring [utilises the] vengefulyūrei archetype of conventional Japanese horror". She argues how this traditional Japanese figure is expressed via a video tape which "embodies contemporary anxieties, in that it is technology through which the repressed past reasserts itself".[5]
Ruth Goldberg argues thatRing expresses "ambivalence about motherhood". She reads Reiko as a mother who – due to the new potential for women's independence – neglects her "natural" role as martyred homemaker in pursuit of an independent identity, subsequently neglecting her child. Goldberg identifies adoubling effect whereby the unconscious conflicts of Reiko's family are expressed via the supernatural in the other family under Reiko's investigation.[6]
Jay McRoy reads the ending hopefully: if the characters therapeutically understand their conflicts, they can live on.[7] Balmain, however, is not optimistic; she reads the replication of the video as technology spreading, virus-like, throughout Japan.[5]
The film's title,Ring, can be interpreted in several ways, such as alluding to the never ending cyclical nature of the ring curse/virus. Another interpretation is that "ring" relates to the phone call which warns those that view the video tape that they will die in seven days,[8] as well as to the view of the ring of light seen from the bottom of the well where Sadako's body was left to decompose or the faint ethereal ring of light is said that people see in the afterlife possibly a metaphor of the well.[9]
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After the moderate success of the 1991 novelRing byKoji Suzuki,Kadokawa Shoten decided to adapt it into a motion picture.
Screenwriter Hiroshi Takahashi and directorHideo Nakata collaborated to work on the script after reading Suzuki's novel and watchingFuji Television's1995 made-for-TV film, directed by Chisui Takigawa.[10] The broadcast version of the 1995 film was re-edited and released on home video under a new title,Ring: Kanzenban (lit. "Ring: The Complete Edition";[10] Nakata did not state which version of it he and Takahashi watched.
In their film script, Takashi and Nakata changed the protagonist's gender (from male to female), name (from Kazuyuki Asakawa to Reiko Asakawa), marital status (from married to divorced) and child's gender and name (from daughter Yoko to son Yoichi).[10]
With the budget of US$1.5 million, the entire production took nine months and one week. According to director Nakata, the script and pre-production process took three or four months, shooting five weeks and post-production four months.[4]
The special effects on the cursed video tape and some parts in the film were shot on a 35 mm film which was passed on to a laboratory in which a computer added a"grainy" effect.[4] Extended visual effects were used in the scene in which the ghost of Sadako Yamamura climbs out of the television. First, they shot thekabuki actressRie Inō walking backwards in a jerky, exaggerated motion. They then played the film in reverse to portray an unnatural-looking walk for Sadako now known in pop culture as "the creepy japanese ghost girl walk" as described by one of the editors friends.[11]
Ring was released in Japan on January 31, 1998, where it was distributed byToho.[1] Upon release in Japan,Ring became the highest-grossing horror film in the country.[12] The film was shown at the 1999Fantasia Film Festival where it won the first place award for Best Feature in the Asian films section.[13]
In the Philippines, the film was given limited releases asRing: Circle of Evil on both December 4, 2002,[14] and January 11, 2003,[15] to coincide with theNorth American remake's release on January 17.
In Japan, the film earned a distribution income (rentals) of¥1 billion in 1998, making it one of the top tenhighest-grossing Japanese films of the year.[16] The film grossed a total Japanese box office revenue of¥1.7 billion[17] (US$13 million).[18]
Variety stated thatRing's "most notable success" has been in Hong Kong, where it became the biggest grosser during the first half of the year, beating popular American films such asThe Matrix, featuring Keanu Reeves[19] On its 1999 Hong Kong release,Ring earnedHK$31.2 million (US$4.03 million) during its two-month theatrical run making it Hong Kong's highest-grossing Japanese-language film.[20] This record was later beaten byStand By Me Doraemon in 2015.[20] In Taiwan, where it released in 1999, the film grossedNT$50.83 million[21] (US$1.619 million).[22]
In France, the film sold 94,257 tickets,[23] equivalent to an estimated gross revenue of approximately€506,160[24] (US$452,737).[25] In South Korea, 56,983 tickets were sold in the capital city ofSeoul,[26] equivalent to an estimated gross revenue of approximately₩341,970,000[27] ($287,656).[25] The film also grossed $150,893 in Chile, the United Kingdom, Russia and New Zealand adding up to an estimated worldwide gross revenue of approximately $19,540,286.[28]
Ring was released directly to home video in the United States and Canada byDreamWorks with English, Spanish, and French subtitles on March 4, 2003,[1] under the transliterated titleRingu.[29]
In the United Kingdom, it was watched by 390,000 viewers on television during the first half of 2005, making it the sixth most-watched foreign-language film on UK television during that period.Ring 2 also drew 360,000 viewers on UK television during the same period, adding up to a combined 750,000 UK television viewership for bothRing films during the first half of 2005.[30]
To coincide with its 20th anniversary,Arrow Films under theirArrow Video imprint issued aBlu-ray Disc ofRing on March 18, 2019, in theUK andIreland. Additionally, a Blu-ray box set featuringRing, the sequelsSpiral andRing 2, and prequelRing 0, was also released. The transfer features a4K resolution restoration that was scanned from the film'soriginal camera negative. The picture grading and restoration, which took place atImagica Labs in Tokyo, was supervised and approved byRing cinematographer Jun'ichirō Hayashi.[31] Both Arrow's singleBlu-ray Disc and Blu-ray box set were later released in theUnited States andCanada on October 29, again under the transliterated titleRingu.[32]
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Thereview aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes gives the film an approval rating of 98% based on 43 reviews, with a weighted average of 7.5 out of 10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Ringu combines supernatural elements with anxieties about modern technology in a truly frightening and unnerving way".[33]
Sight & Sound criticMark Kermode praised the film's "timeless terror", with its "combination of old folk devils and contemporarymoral panics" which appeal to both teen and adult audiences alike.[12] While Adam Smith ofEmpire Online finds the film "throttled by its over complexity, duff plotting and a distinct lack of actual action",[34] Kermode emphasizes that "one is inclined to conclude that it is the telling, rather than the content of the tale, that is all-important".[12]Variety agrees that the slow pace, with "its gradual evocation of evil lying await beneath the surface of normality", is one of the film's biggest strengths.[35]Ring was listed as the twelfth best horror film of all time byThe Guardian[36] and also picked by Stuart Heritage in the same paper as the film that frightened him most.[37]
Ring was ranked No. 69 inEmpire magazine's "The 100 Best Films of World Cinema" in 2010.[38] In the early 2010s,Time Out conducted a poll with several authors, directors, actors and critics who have worked within the horror genre to vote for their top horror films.[39]Ring placed at number 61 on their top 100 list.[40]
The international success of the Japanese films launched a revival of horror film making in Japan that resulted in such pictures asKiyoshi Kurosawa's2001 filmPulse (known as Kairo (回路;lit. "Circuit") in Japan),Takashi Shimizu'sThe Grudge (呪怨,Juon) (2000), Hideo Nakata'sDark Water (仄暗い水の底から,Honogurai Mizu no Soko kara;lit. "From the Depths of Dark Water"), also based on a short story by Suzuki), and Higuchinsky'sUzumaki (2000, a.k.a.Vortex, based on theJunji Ito horrormanga of the same name).
Ring had some influence on Western cinema and gained cult status in the West.[41]
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Hollywood horror had largely been dominated by theslasher sub-genre, which relied on on-screen violence, shock tactics, and gore.[41]Ring, whose release in Japan roughly coincided withThe Blair Witch Project in the United States, helped to revitalize the genre by taking a more restrained approach to horror, leaving much of the terror to the audience's imagination.[41] The film initiated global interest in Japanese cinema in general andJapanese horror cinema in particular, a renaissance which led to the coining of the termJ-Horror in the West. This "New Asian Horror"[5] resulted in further successful releases, such asJu-on: The Grudge andDark Water.[7] In addition to Japanese productions this boom also managed to bring attention to similar films made in East Asia at the same time such asA Tale of Two Sisters from South Korea andThe Eye from Hong Kong.
All of these films were later remade in English. Released in 2002,The Ring reached number 1 at the box office and grossed slightly more in Japan than the original.[5] The originalRing grossed¥1.7 billion in 1998,[17] whileThe Ring remake grossed¥1.75 billion in 2002.[42]
The original sequel wasSpiral, released in 1998, but due to its poor reception, a new sequel,Ring 2, was released in 1999 which continued the story line of this film. It was followed by a 2000 prequel,Ring 0: Birthday, followed bySadako in 2019.Spiral in turn was followed bySadako 3D in 2012 andSadako 3D 2 in 2013. Another installment,Sadako DX, was released in 2022.
A television series,Ring: The Final Chapter, was made, with a similar storyline but many changes in characters and their backstories. A South Korean remakeThe Ring Virus was made in 1999, as well as an American remake,The Ring, in 2002 as previously mentioned.
The story goes that seven days after viewing the tape, those who watch will receive a phone call (hence the first interpretation of 'the ring') [...]
The Ring
1997 […] Foreign […] 6,000
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