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Fantasia 2019: ‘Sadako’ is an Underwhelming Entry in the Ringu Franchise

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As another entry into the Ringu franchise, Sadako tells a rather lackluster tale burdened with side stories and shallow mysteries. Emphasizing the “slow” portion of a slow burn, the story meanders without a strong sense of direction. It follows the breadcrumbs of the previous films, but it tends to get a bit lost along the way. 

Sadako follows a few different threads. A young girl with amnesia is found wandering the streets after narrowly escaping a fire in her home that was set by her psychic mother, who held the belief that her daughter was a reincarnation of the legendary Sadako. She’s brought to a hospital where she meets Mayu Akikawa (Elaiza Ikeda, Isle of Dogs), a psychologist who takes a shining to the girl. But Akikawa’s main focus is on trying to track down her missing brother, Kazuma (Hiroya Shimizu, The Outsider) who disappeared after investigating the burned-out shell of the girl’s apartment for his YouTube channel. 

(C)2019 “Sadako” Film Partners

Our main focus as a viewer is on Akikawa, but because her attention is devoted to the plotlines of other characters, she doesn’t have much of a story of her own. Her main purpose is to pursue the plot as it unfolds around Kazuma, the young girl, and Sadako herself, unraveling each mystery as she attempts to find and save her brother. 

While we focus on Akikawa, we spend very little time with the girl who is supposedly a reincarnation of Sadako; we don’t really get a clear sense of their connection. Which is kind of a shame because there could have been a lot more to explore there. Instead, we’re left with just snapshots of her “abilities” as Akikawa takes the lead, pulling focus away from Sadako by concentrating on the search for Kazuma (who, as a character, is too annoying and inconsequential to be of any concern to the audience). 

(C)2019 “Sadako” Film Partners

Hideo Nakata who brought us Ringu back in 1998 returns for Sadako with writer Noriaki Sugihara (Sadako 2 3D). The direction of the film works particularly well during the scenes where Nakata lets Sadako out of the box to play. Unfortunately, that doesn’t happen too often. For a film called Sadako, she actually isn’t given a heck of a lot to do in the film. She briefly pops out a couple of times, but as an audience, you expect more from her. 

Sugihara’s script is a bit disjointed it hops around between an exploration of YouTube culture (which is introduced early on and then dropped entirely), to stirring up tension with the little girl (which quickly dissipates and gets forgotten), to building a series of mysteries to be solved (including the lore of Sadako herself, which is only touched upon briefly). It’s hard to really connect with the film when it changes hands so often. 

(C)2019 “Sadako” Film Partners

The sound design captures the steadily growing fear in the film; Sadako is textured with an unnerving yet beautiful theme that weaves itself throughout. Ambient sounds build tension and create a general sense of unease. Japanese horror cinema does some incredible things with sound design — Ringu and Ju-On being notable examples — so while Sadako does a good job of building tone and atmosphere, it isn’t quite up to par with its predecessors. 

As an entry in the Ringu franchise, Sadako is a serviceable offering. It continues the mythology and adds a bit more to the texture of the character. As a horror film, it’s really underwhelming. Too much time is spent on the drama and mystery of Kazuma, and not enough is spent on the actual meat of the story the titular Sadako herself. Gone are the guttural whispers of “seven days”, and the horrific imagery is drastically toned down. 

If you’re keen on watching a film that misleadingly focuses on the search for a tiresome character, Sadako is the right choice. If you’re looking for something with genuine scares that has all the benchmarks of classic J-horror… maybe skip this one.

 

Sadako is playing as part of Fantasia Festival’s 2019 lineup. For more films, check out their website or keep an eye out for our reviews.

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Another Creepy Spider Movie Hits Shudder This Month

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Good spider films are a theme this year. First, we had Sting and then there was Infested. The former is still in theaters and the latter is coming to Shudder starting April 26.

Infested has been getting some good reviews. People are saying that it’s not only a great creature feature but also a social commentary on racism in France.

According to IMDb: Writer/director Sébastien Vanicek was looking for ideas around the discrimination faced by black and Arab-looking people in France, and that led him to spiders, which are rarely welcome in homes; whenever they’re spotted, they’re swatted. As everyone in the story (people and spiders) is treated like vermin by society, the title came to him naturally.

Shudder has become the gold standard for streaming horror content. Since 2016, the service has been offering fans an expansive library of genre movies. in 2017, they began to stream exclusive content.

Since then Shudder has become a powerhouse in the film festival circuit, buying distribution rights to movies, or just producing some of their own. Just like Netflix, they give a film a short theatrical run before adding it to their library exclusively for subscribers.

Late Night With the Devil is a great example. It was released theatrically on March 22 and will begin streaming on the platform starting April 19.

While not getting the same buzz as Late Night, Infested is a festival favorite and many have said if you suffer from arachnophobia, you might want to take heed before watching it.

Infested

According to the synopsis, our main character, Kalib is turning 30 and dealing with some family issues. “He’s fighting with his sister over an inheritance and has cut ties with his best friend. Fascinated by exotic animals, he finds a venomous spider in a shop and brings it back to his apartment. It only takes a moment for the spider to escape and reproduce, turning the whole building into a dreadful web trap. The only option for Kaleb and his friends is to find a way out and survive.”

The film will be available to watch on Shudder starting April 26.

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Part Concert, Part Horror Movie M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘Trap’ Trailer Released

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In true Shyamalan form, he sets his film Trap inside a social situation where we aren’t sure what is going on. Hopefully, there is a twist at the end. Furthermore, we hope it’s better than the one in his divisive 2021 movie Old.

The trailer seemingly gives away a lot, but, as in the past, you can’t rely on his trailers because they are often red herrings and you are being gaslit to think a certain way. For instance, his movie Knock at the Cabin was completely different than what the trailer implied and if you hadn’t read the book on which the film is based it was still like going in blind.

The plot for Trap is being dubbed an “experience” and we aren’t quite sure what that means. If we were to guess based on the trailer, it’s a concert movie wrapped around a horror mystery. There are original songs performed by Saleka, who plays Lady Raven, a kind of Taylor Swift/Lady Gaga hybrid. They have even set up a Lady Raven website to further the illusion.

Here is the fresh trailer:

According to the synopsis, a father takes his daughter to one of Lady Raven’s jam-packed concerts, “where they realize they’re at the center of a dark and sinister event.”

Written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, Trap stars Josh Hartnett, Ariel Donoghue, Saleka Shyamalan, Hayley Mills and Allison Pill. The film is produced by Ashwin Rajan, Marc Bienstock and M. Night Shyamalan. The executive producer is Steven Schneider.

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Woman Brings Corpse Into Bank To Sign Loan Papers

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Warning: This is a disturbing story.

You have to be pretty desperate for money to do what this Brazilian woman did at the bank to get a loan. She wheeled in a fresh corpse to endorse the contract and she seemingly thought the bank employees wouldn’t notice. They did.

This weird and disturbing story comes via ScreenGeek an entertainment digital publication. They write that a woman identified as Erika de Souza Vieira Nunes pushed a man she identified as her uncle into the bank pleading with him to sign loan papers for $3,400. 

If you’re squeamish or easily triggered, be aware that the video captured of the situation is disturbing. 

Latin America’s largest commercial network, TV Globo, reported on the crime, and according to ScreenGeek this is what Nunes says in Portuguese during the attempted transaction. 

“Uncle, are you paying attention? You must sign [the loan contract]. If you don’t sign, there’s no way, as I cannot sign on your behalf!”

She then adds: “Sign so you can spare me further headaches; I can’t bear it any longer.” 

At first we thought this might be a hoax, but according to Brazilian police, the uncle, 68-year-old Paulo Roberto Braga had passed away earlier that day.

 “She attempted to feign his signature for the loan. He entered the bank already deceased,” Police Chief Fábio Luiz said in an interview with TV Globo. “Our priority is to continue investigating to identify other family members and gather more information regarding this loan.”

If convicted Nunes could be facing jail time on charges of fraud, embezzlement, and desecration of a corpse.

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