Kailansorac Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

TaryBiggBall It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Cristal The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Tweekums Set thirty years before the original films this instalment of the franchise looks into Sadako's life in the run-up to her death. It opens with reporter Akiko Miyaji investigating the death of journalists, including her fiancé at an ESP demonstration by Shizuko Yamamura; Sadako's mother. This leads her to Sadako who is now working as an understudy at a small theatre. Two of her fellow actresses have had strange dreams about a well… shortly afterwards one of them dies. She was the leading actress and her role is offered to Sadako. Soon people are blaming her for the death and that only increases as strange things start to happen; more people have the same strange dream and an audio tape recording has a strange sound on it. On the day of the play one of these people plays the recording of the ESP demonstration and Sadako has visions of her late mother. Things then turn more unpleasant.While this isn't quite as creepy as the original film it does provide an interesting backstory for Sadako. It was nice to see that she wasn't always the evil creature we see in the early films. The idea that there are in fact two of her; the one that is seen and another who is glimpsed or seen in pictures is intriguing. The way much of the action takes place on stage adds to the strangeness as sometimes we are watching a play and sometimes real events and it isn't always immediately obvious which. This also provides an excuse to have characters dressed more like people in Edwardian Europe than sixties Japan. As the story nears its conclusion the tension increases and even though we know that Sadako must ultimately end up in the well the final scenes are still disturbing and explain why she became a vengeful spirit. Overall I'd say that this was an effective chiller which was both interesting and somewhat disturbing at times.

Tokyo-1997 I found this to be an excellent movie. First of all, this movie is really terrifying. This movie might even be almost as scary as the original ringu. There were a few interesting scares during the second half of the movie and there were a few jumpy scenes as well. There were more scares in this movie than the original ringu, though as a whole this movie isn't as scary as the original. The ending for this movie was a very sad and scary one. Basically, this movie explains why Sadako ended up being thrown in the well. This movie is electrifying, and is interesting that some of the scary scenes took place in the forest. There was one scene where Sadako seem to even twist her own body. I thought that was terrifying and rather unique. This movie starts of being very interesting for the first twenty minutes, then continues with some long draggy and boring dialogs showing how Sadako and the other man build up their relationship slowly. The scenes that took place in the theatre just got draggy after the first twenty minutes. However, let the show take a little while to grab you. Halfway during the movie, it grabbed me, and I could not stop watching this film. This film is both electrifying and relatively sad. Another major complain I have about this film is that very much like ringu, the scariest scenes in this film take place entirely during the day and not at night. This eases out a lot of tension and fear when I watch the movie. Other than that, this movie has an interesting storyline, an interesting idea, a relatively touching film. This film is recommended. Score: 8/10

gothic_a666 Prequels walk a very thin line. On one hand a prequel has to expand the already established universe with enough information to justify its existence on the other it must conform to canon events without much deviation lest it become a spin-off instead. Ring Zero manages to accomplish both of these goals: it adds a new point of view by placing the focus firmly on the psychological around which the plot as we know it is constructed.The result is a movie that is not particularly scary but very interesting and even moving. Sadako is at the center of the story. No longer a shifty figure barely glimpsed in distorted scenes she is now a real person and an agreeable one at that. The staples of the franchise are of course present (the well, the sea, blurred television shots, garbled sounds) but they are used soberly and sparingly. Sadako's ordeal is of course a given but it is rescued from being a mere horror convention by the addition of the human element.More than a horror movie Ring Zero is a tragedy. It proposes an explanation as to what Sadako but what is memorable about it is that it elicits sympathy from the viewer. The psychological slant is linear enough (unlike most of Asian horror that follows such an approach) but it is solid and fleshes out the character convincingly. Unlike most movies in the genre here we do not have the typical creepy villain but a well rounded character all around. In the end the real horror is not so much the supernatural that is of course not absent but societal pressure and lack of empathy. And that makes Ring Zero worth watching indeed.

jeangel Beautiful, with an ending that will scare you more then all three scream movies put together. Emotional, you really will feel for Sadako, and you see that her story is tragic. This film will change the way you look all of the others in the series, it brings so much more depth. My personal favorite of all the movies in the Ringu series, and my favorite J-Horror film, it is an instant classic. It has wonderful acting, great cinematography, and scares that come from deep with in, not your shock scares of American horror. You will find yourself watching it again and again, and that all the others in the series make so much more sense. Don't pass this one up, you will regret in the next life.