Review: Rings

Matilda Lutz finds out her college boyfriend has been dabbling in the subcultural surrounding a mysterious videotape that blah blah…7 days until you die. Yadda Yadda. The girl has to watch the tape to save her boyfriend. You know the drill by now, and no I’m not going to take this review remotely seriously. Johnny Galecki plays a college professor, Vincent D’Onofrio plays a blind man.

Full disclosure: This movie isn’t for me and was never going to be. I hate the “Ringu” flicks, whether they’re the Japanese ones or the Americanised ones. Frankly, I’m not a huge fan of J-horror at all, though there have been a few good ones. This F. Javier Gutiérrez flick (his English language debut) from 2017 is…not one of the good ones. In fact, it’s the worst one yet that I’ve been an unfortunate witness to. I think aside from the fact that all these J-horror (or Americanised versions of J-horror) films are basically the same, my main problem with this series in particular is its basic trope. See, I wouldn’t watch the tape. I’m overly cautious in that regard, so I can’t really relate or sympathise because I feel like you’re kind of an idiot who gets what they’ve asked for by watching the tape.

The film doesn’t start horribly. Aside from strangely cutting away before the end, the opening scene is fun stuff. That’s probably because it’s less J-horror and more “Final Destination” minus the gore. I’ll take that. I’ll take any pleasure I can possibly get here. However, straight after that scene the film lost me. I’m sorry, but in 2017 VCRs are not ‘cool’ and ‘vintage’ things that people seek out at flea markets. Fuck off, that’s just silly. I’ve always liked the basic idea of finding ghostly and unexplained images in photos or film footage. That part taps into my “Unsolved Mysteries” side. However, what these films do with that idea bores the living shit out of me, especially when here they don’t even bother giving it much of a technological upgrade. That’s incredibly disappointing. On the plus side, I don’t like the basic look these films are destined to adopt, but this is by far the best version of it. A couple of scenes even manage to have a nice summer glow about them, and I appreciated that break from the norm. I also appreciated how good Emilia Clarke-lookalike Matilda Lutz looks in her underwear. Hey, I’m trying to say nice things about the film, OK? This shit’s hard. Otherwise, you’ll get a lot of the “Ringu” green filter of dread applied.

Lutz isn’t bad in the lead, but outside of her…woof. Johnny Galecki can act a bit, he does it on “The Big Bang Theory” rather well. Here he tries to play the groovy professor bonking one of his students. It’s so incredibly not his thing. At all. He also gives a performance somewhere in the vicinity of a man being held at gunpoint to appear on camera. Surely one of the highest paid TV stars didn’t need the cash, and I would hope he’d be smart enough to know this is crap. I’m assuming the sunglasses Vincent D’Onofrio wears here are less about his character’s blindness and more to hide the actor’s crushing boredom. Like Galecki, you struggle to figure out why he’s even here.

Curses are bullshit, and this one’s not even interesting like the “Final Destination” franchise occasionally was in not only how the curse played out, but the ways the characters tried to break the curse. None of that proves interesting in this franchise, and certainly not in this tired entry. I did find it hilarious that the lead actress’ last name is Lutz, given that name’s connection to a certain family of haunted house bullshit artists. All my giveashit here was drained after about 30 minutes and even then I wasn’t all that compelled. Scripted by the trio of David Loucka (the terrific “The Dream Team”, the lame “The House at the End of the Street”), Akiva Goldsman (“Silent Fall”, “A Beautiful Mind”, “Batman Forever”, “I, Robot”), and Jacob Estes (writer-director of the overrated “Mean Creek”), the climax borrows way too much from a better horror/thriller from the previous year. It’s pretty blatant, actually though apparently the film was shot in 2015 with some later tweaking/reshooting, so perhaps those scenes were already in the can before the other film was even out. I highly doubt it. It’s a good-looking film, with one truly gorgeous shot of a house exterior bathed in the shadow of tree leaves. The film itself however is empty.

I had so hoped that this would be the one film in the franchise that worked for me, but that would’ve involved not copying all of the previous films in look, feel, and plot. And if there’s one thing you can be sure of in J-horror (or Americanised versions of J-horror) it’s that it’ll never, ever break from the formula. Thing is though, I hear even fans of this kind of thing hated this one, and not just because one of the screenwriters is the ominous Akiva Goldsman. If you’re a series fan, you’ve seen it done better. If you’re like me and not a fan, skip it.

Rating: D