Intermission: 'The Grudge' uses nonlinear style as gimmick

|tab|

After becoming the only country to have nuclear weapons used against it, Japan in post World War II, early nuclear era began producing a great number of horror/monster lms. Myriad other "freaks of nuclear fallout" monsters followed "Godzilla." |ret||ret||tab|

Japanese directors have been carrying on the horror tradition for half a century. |ret||ret||tab|

In recent years, the Japanese have also given us the genre known as anime, which is stylized animation loaded with futurism, violence and sex.|ret||ret||tab|

Now comes the new wave of Japanese horror referred to as "J-Horror" led by director Hideo Nakata's "Ringu." That lm was remade in America by director Gore Verbinski as "The Ring" and has spawned a prequel, a sequel and a couple of TV series. I haven't seen "Ringu," but wasn't all that impressed with "The Ring."|ret||ret||tab|

The latest in J-Horror is "The Grudge." |ret||ret||tab|

Being released in the horror prime-time Halloween season, the lm was sure to attract an audience. It did so, and it came in at the top of box ofce grosses in its rst weekend.|ret||ret||tab|

It's pretty spooky and, for my money, a lot better than "The Ring," but the back story on this American remake of "Ju-On" is more interesting than the lm is scary.|ret||ret||tab|

The original Japanese lm was released in 2003. A scant year later we have the Americanized version, and it's directed by the same man, Takashi Shimizu, who made the original.|ret||ret||tab|

On the surface, that is hard to gure. A little thought sheds a lot of light.|ret||ret||tab|

The biggest change, I suppose, is adding Hollywood names like Sarah Michelle Gellar ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Scream 2," "I Know What You Did Last Summer") and Jason Behr from "Dawson's Creek." |ret||ret||tab|

Hollywood producers know what the kids want, and the kids want their scares to come from people they know. The PG-13 rating also tells a story that of the studio marketing people making sure the lm was "placed" properly.|ret||ret||tab|

The results found in "The Grudge" are OK, but my guess is the original, which isn't yet available for home viewing, is scarier, even if less "marketable."|ret||ret||tab|

The lm's tag line, "When someone dies in the grip of a powerful rage, a curse is born," is a nice setup, and the opening scene is a clever diversion playing on the viewer's preconceived notions. |ret||ret||tab|

In the opening, a man named Peter played by the always-good Bill Pullman is seen sitting on a balcony in the early morning. His wife wakes up, says, "You're up early," and Peter throws himself overboard. The viewer wonders why an actor of Pullman's status would be hired for a two-minute opening scene, but soon realizes the narrative of "The Grudge" is nonlinear. Pullman appears in later chronologically earlier scenes.|ret||ret||tab|

Gellar plays Karen, an American studying in Japan. She has a job at a social service organization. She's still learning the ropes but gets assigned to her rst "home visit" when another worker fails to show up. |ret||ret||tab|

The audience already knows what has happened, but the actors don't.|ret||ret||tab|

Karen goes to the home of a woman suffering from dementia who spends most of her time nearly catatonic in bed or staring ominously around the set. Not only has Yoko (the original caregiver) disappeared, but this woman's son and daughter-in-law also are missing. Anyone who has ever seen a horror lm would be out of that place in 10 seconds.|ret||ret||tab|

But not Karen. |ret||ret||tab|

She wants to nd out what's going on. The audience, too, wants to stitch some logical story together from the previous scenes.|ret||ret||tab|

The place Karen is in is a classic haunted house. The tag line mentioned above explains it all ... somehow.|ret||ret||tab|

I don't mind nonlinear storytelling "Reservoir Dogs" is a favorite but sometimes the technique can become a mere gimmick. It steps close to that line in "The Grudge."|ret||ret||tab|

I'm assuming that a DVD release of Shimizu's original "Ju-On" is soon to come, and I have high hopes for it. This remake, while not a bad lm, reveals all too well Hollywood's tendency to manipulate an audience and a market. |ret||ret||tab|

|ret||ret||tab|

Jim Wunderle owns Wunderle Sound Services and is a Springeld free-lance writer and musician.|ret||ret||tab|

[[In-content Ad]]