Grave Halloween (2013)

"An American college student studying in Japan risks her own life to save the spirit of her dead mother, who killed herself in the notorious Suicide Forest."

Have you heard of Aokigahara Forest before? No? Me neither. Apparently, it's the trendy place to go if you want to commit suicide in Japan, and there's a famous book about it from the 1960s called "Black Sea of Trees" by Seichō Matsumoto. It's also the setting for Steven R. Monroe's vengeful ghost movie "Grave Halloween".

Since Hallowe'en is a Western custom, if you're now wondering what Japanese ghosts have to do with it, remember that this is a "Syfy Original" movie. Even the most tenuous links will suffice when Syfy are putting titles together for their "31 Days of Halloween" month. The Japanese may not celebrate Hallowe'en as such (although many of them are aware of it), but this movie is primarily about a group of American and Canadian exchange students who decide to film their investigation of the haunted Aokigahara Forest on Hallowe'en anyway. Additionally, it was all shot in Vancouver.

Director Steven R. Monroe is, of course, famous (or infamous) for the "I Spit on Your Grave" remake, its sequel, and nearly a dozen more cheap and nasty Syfy Channel movies. Basically, he's a professional director for hire rather than an auteur, but he usually manages to slip a nice bit of gore into his movies as a kind of trademark. Thus, "Grave Halloween" may surprise a few people with the level of gore in a made-for-TV movie. There's a stick through the throat, an "Evil Dead"-style pulling of arms and legs off, and a fairly realistic broken leg among the effects. Obviously, there's no swearing or nudity this time because "Grave Halloween" is another hypocritical MA-14.

Canadian Kaitlyn Leeb and a taller American guy.

Fans of Asian horror will certainly find something to enjoy in this movie even if it's only to ogle half-Chinese Kaitlyn Leeb (the three-breasted woman from the "Total Recall" remake). Her character, Maiko, is the one responsible for everyone going to the forest due to her birth-mother's suicide there and having received a mysterious box of trinkets through the mail which she wants to use for a Sadake (or blessing/atonement) ritual. If you aren't down with the kids who all seem to be obsessed with Japan these days, or have never heard of "Sadake" before, simply replace the word with Sudoku because it's only a MacGuffin. The students never get to perform their ritual or play Sudoku because they're too busy getting killed by long-haired ghosts!

Ignoring the Japanese elements, "Grave Halloween" is essentially a backwoods slasher which homages "The Evil Dead" and "The Blair Witch Project". Unlike the latter, however, it's not a found footage movie, just one that's quickly filmed with slightly shaky handycams. It's bickering "teenagers" getting bumped off, one by one, by various ghosts (some of which look a lot like zombies) with all the usual clichés and tropes.

The main actors are a mix of bit part players from American and Canadian TV, but they do okay in their poorly differentiated and two-dimensional roles. It's not worth mentioning their names because nobody has ever heard of them. One of the more obnoxious Americans says, "That's super comforting!" at 42 minutes in, and if you already know my feelings about this bloody annoying valley girl intensifier, you'll probably be surprised that I didn't switch the movie off right there and then. But I made it to the end (with my teeth-clenched in fury) just so that I could pan it some more.

Apart from being predictable, the worst thing about "Grave Halloween" is that the backstory is more interesting than the mystery which unfolds or the creepiness of the setting. The details about Japan, its laws and customs, and how ignorant gaijin (foreigners) often behave like disrepectful assholes (and deserve to be cursed) are spot-on, but for all the positives, too much relies on xenophobia. Maybe that's a good thing, though, if it keeps people away from the real Suicide Forest.

Noroi: The Curse (2005)

"A documentary filmmaker explores seemingly unrelated paranormal incidents connected by the legend of an ancient demon called the 'kagutaba'."

Before I begin, I just have to point out that the Amazon affiliate link which I've used to display the DVD cover art (to the left) is wrong. "Noroi" is a Japanese horror movie not a Korean one. I know that won't matter to any of you who have the Amazon links blocked with Adblock Plus (which I'm sure is most of you since I never get any money), but I thought I'd point it out anyway.

You aren't going to need to buy "Noroi" if you want to watch it anyway. It's all over YouTube either in its entirety or in parts, and I even have the English subtitled version embedded above for your viewing pleasure. Be aware that it's nearly 2 hours long though so that "pleasure" might just turn into boredom and frustration if you are anything like me.

I settled down to watch this last night after what seems like years of people telling me that I had to see it and "it's the scariest film ever!". Obviously, I didn't have to see it and, to be honest, it wasn't the scariest film ever either.

Having looked up the names of the characters on the IMDb, I can tell you that chubby Jin Muraki played the paranormal investigator named Masafumi Kobayashi, ex-porn star Maria Takagi (who you really do need to do a Google image search on) played herself for all of a minute, and Marika Matsumoto also played herself in a role comparable to Sarah Greene from the BBC's "Ghostwatch" (1992).

I know you've never heard of any of these people and nor have I. We can all cut the pretence out straight away. Thus, the biggest thing that "Noroi" has in its favour is that it looks more like a real found footage movie (until near the end) simply because there are no recognisable faces in it for a Western audience.

Call me a pervert ("Hey, Dr Blood, you're a pervert!"), but I really enjoyed watching little Marika Matsumoto getting possessed by a demon and stuff. She was playing "herself" so I assume she's a known actress or TV personality in Japan. Strangely, considering Japan's internationally famous TV shows, she didn't come across as stupid and self-deprecating unlike how Western presenters always do. I liked her.

The paranormal investigator/journalist Kobayashi was a bit dour and I didn't warm to him at all. I really think he was the least credible character in the whole thing although, obviously, he wasn't more annoying that the crazy, tinfoil-wearing psychic, Mitsuo Hori (Satoru Jitsunashi), who completely overdid the comic relief.

Kobayashi's wife, Keiko (played by Miyoko Hanai), was far too pretty for him, and, without giving too much away, that marriage was destined to not last past the end of the film. There were some very good-looking women in this, for sure, even though most of them only had small roles.

As you will see for yourself, "Noroi" looked just like every other faux found footage movie complete with shakycam moments and bits where you wonder why they were still filming. It was done better than most until it jumped the shark with an almost "Trollhunter" moment 20 minutes before the end. Such silliness meant that it could never recover so, of course, the ending was then ruined by even more excesses.

"Noroi" dragged on far too long, had too many silly moments to be scary, and the whole "demon summoning" thing wasn't very interesting to me. I think it was unnecessarily complicated for something with a core plot which was so basic, and I don't recommend it at all.

Asian Horror Playlist

While I was browsing YouTube for something to watch, I started finding lots of full Asian horror movies with English subtitles and decided to make a playlist out of them.

Even though every Asian horror movie that I've ever watched seems to be exactly the same with long-haired ghosts and schoolgirls in uniform, I've still watched quite a few of them either on YouTube or Netflix when I had it.

I still don't own any Asian horror movies on DVD apart from "Ringu" (1998) and "The Host" (2006). I've never even opened "Ringu" and you can see that it's still shrink-wrapped. I know it's a bit crass but I actually prefer the American remakes. I also have "The Vengeance Trilogy" but I don't count any of those as horror.

If I was to start collecting them, I'd probably also buy "Dear Friend" (2004) which is much the same as "Forget Me Not" (2009), the original version of "Shutter" (2004), "Dream Home" (2010), and, of course, "The Cat" (2011).

Anyway, if you like Asian horror then you might find something new to enjoy on my playlist. If you have any other recommendations for me, please leave them as a comment below.

Ju-on: White Ghost / Black Ghost (2009)

(AKA Ju-on: Shiroi rôjo & Ju-on: Kuroi shôjo)



"Writer-director Takashi Shimizu toasts the 10th anniversary of his influential horror film Ju-on with two spooky shorts. In "White Ghost," a psychic teen terrorizes his family. In "Black Ghost," a patient learns the truth about a cyst in her body."

Although both these stories are written by the director of "Ju-on", the helm has been slightly handed over to Ryûta Miyake and Mari Asato respectively. You can still tell that Takashi Shimizu had a lot of input other than just writing. In spite of a much lower budget than the original "Ju-on" which makes them look more like TV episodes rather than movies, they are just as creepy as the rest of the series and a lot better than the American remakes.

Packaging these two shorts together is probably the best way of marketing them as the difference in style can be compared to "Two Evil Eyes" (1990) in that one film is slightly better than the other and you would be unlikely to want it individually.

Ryûta Miyake's "White Ghost" (AKA "The Grudge: Old Lady in White") is very much in the tradition of the very first "Ju-on" with a mixed-up chronological order and brutal murders which stain anyone who comes into even indirect contact with them. It's a bit like the "six degrees of Kevin Bacon" thing but more contagious and deadly. Anyone who knows someone involved ends up cursed.

There isn't really a lot I can say about "White Ghost" without giving away spoilers but the special effects are quite realistic and one kill in particular involving a baseball bat works very well indeed. The old woman of the title is really freaky in a very Bette Davis way.

Mari Asato's "Black Ghost" (AKA "The Grudge: Girl in Black") isn't so good though I think that watching it immediately after "White Ghost" is the biggest problem. On its own it wouldn't be a bad film and it has a strong start but it's undoubtedly the very weakest link in the "Ju-on" movies in much the same way that "The Grudge 3" was for the American series.

I have no idea why the ghostly little boy, Toshio, even makes a cameo appearance in "Black Ghost" (especially without his cat) apart from force-feeding the story into the rest of the "Ju-on" series as I started to mentally switch off during all the ridiculous stuff in the hospital and couldn't be bothered to watch it through again.

Whereas I quite enjoyed "White Ghost", I found that I couldn't get into "Black Ghost" to the same extent. There isn't much to choose from between them but the second story is noticeably weaker and, maybe it's just me, but I found it to be too overacted and comedic in places to be genuinely scary.

Ichi the Killer (2001)

"Yakuza boss Anjo disappears with three hundred million yen. His loyal gang members, lead by the masochist Kakihara, start a search, but their aggressive and gory methods worry the other yakuza gangs. Kakiharas most frightening counterpart is the mysterious Ichi, a psychopathic killer with a dark childhood secret, who is controlled by a retired cop."

Having just wasted the last two hours of my life watching this utter drivel, all I really want to do now is use every expletive under the sun to describe how appallingly shit "Ichi the Killer" was. As amusing as that would be, it isn't my style and wouldn't really be all that informative for anyone who hasn't watched the film.

Yes, I know that it was made in 2001 and special effects have improved since then but honestly this was like some kind of unintentional comedy. All the spurting blood effects which were obviously copied by Quentin Tarantino for "Kill Bill" just threw me right out of the action such as it was. The characters were all beyond ridiculous and the negligible plot did very little to hold my interest. It seemed to be nothing but set pieces of gore and violence just for the sake of it.

You should all know by now that I'm certainly no prude and I'm also one of the least artistically-minded horror movie reviewers on the internet but I do like a good story and sympathetic characters. I wasn't looking for some big, thought-provoking work of art with "Ichi the Killer" but I was expecting to not be bored out of my mind by it.

Honestly, how do all these Takashi Miike fanboys manage to delude themselves and other people that "Ichi the Killer" is so fantastic? Apart from one of the prostitutes who kept switching from English to Japanese, there wasn't even any worthwhile heterosexual eyecandy in the thing!

Yes, Takeshii Miike fanboys, I'm calling you out! This film is GAY! It's so homoerotic that I'd put it up there with David DeCoteau's "Leeches". Of course there's nothing wrong with any of that particularly if a gang of misogynistic, genital-torturing Yakuza floats your boat but it did nothing for me.

I pretty much hated every minute of this film from the title appearing in a pool of sperm to the ending which I couldn't understand. I'm not being racist but at least two of the actors looked almost identical and I really couldn't tell who was doing what to who or why. Was the blond one only blond so that he could be more easily identified by a Western audience? And what was up with his cheeks being sliced open and clipped together? I didn't get any of it and couldn't even be bothered to follow what was going on after a while.

Suffice it to say that I did work out that a "Muscle Mary" cop called Jigii had brainwashed crybaby Ichi into killing the Yakuza for him somehow using post-hypnotic suggestions but the rest of it, including all the torture, just washed over me like some really cheap and unpleasant predecessor to "Horsemen" (which I also had the misfortune to watch through Netflix a little while ago).

I suppose a lot of people would credit "Ichi the Killer" with kicking off the whole "torture porn" wave of over-the-top gory effects-driven movies which ruined the 2000s for everyone. Gruesome scenes do not make a horror movie if they come without any emotional investment in the characters. Since there were no "good" characters in the film at all, what was the point? People who enjoy crap like this would probably get off watching cockfights or a couple of pitbulls tearing each other apart with just the same feeling of moral detachment.

I have honestly never hated a film as much in my life as this one. There are no merits to it at all. Without doubt, "Ichi the Killer" is simply the worst kind of poorly written and directed pulp. It was at least an hour too long as well. Avoid!

Battle Royale II (2003)

While there's still lots of gory fun including exploding heads, decapitations, gunshot wounds, eviscerations and other nastiness, "Battle Royale II: Requiem" just isn't as good as the original.

The main reason is that after all the excitement of the first half an hour or so, it all gets very talky with huge boring sermons about how bad war is.

All I wanted to see was Japanese kids shooting each other. That idea seemed to be very promising as, this time round, they all start off with huge machine guns (and rocket launchers!) rather than having to spend most of the film finding them.

The twist is that the kids are each linked to a partner. If the partner dies then the collar they wear explodes. So the body count in the early stages of the film is quite high and lots of characters who could die in a blaze of machine gun induced nastiness just get blown up - which is a waste! Even the "teacher", who looks a lot like a leather-clad Japanese version of Les Mckeown, makes remarks along the same lines.

So, by my reckoning, if one of the characters in a film comments about how lame things are then it pretty much sums up the state of play.

The other plot change in "BRII" to the original is that the kids are sent to an island to wipe out "terrorists" who are actually the survivors of the first "Battle Royale". This turns out to be a pretty stupid idea too. Once the kids reach the terrorists, they are instantly captured and relieved of their collars. Then it all gets really dull.

Of course my real reason for liking these films is all the pretty Japanese schoolgirls, which is fine as they are all obviously older than the characters they are playing. Only a couple stand out this time, but none are as interesting as the ones in the original "Battle Royale". Characterisation is given short shrift here in favour of all the speeches by the extremely hairy "terrorists".

In summary, it's 8 out of 10 for blood and guts, 2 out of 10 for the rest of the film. I just didn't feel involved enough in the story this time round to care one way or another who died. Let's hope BRIII is better.