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The Ring
Studio: DreamWorks
Year: 2002
Rated: PG-13
Film Length: 115 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 16X9 Enhanced Widescreen (1.85:1)
Subtitles: English, French and Spanish
Before you die, you see the ring
You gotta hand it to the marketing team at DreamWorks...
they invested a crapload of money into early marketing
aimed to sucker people into believing that The
Ring was the scariest film since The Exorcist.
What is actually very scary is that it worked! By
the time the film was released, people flocked in
droves to see the film and The Ring managed to
become the studio's biggest moneymaker of 2002, as it
rang up a box-office total of about $125.3 million.
Based on a years-old Japanese film, Ringu,
The Ring explores an urban legend surrounding a
mysterious and unlabeled video tape. Watch it and
you’ll die seven days later.
Rachel (Naomi Watts)is an investigative newspaper
reporter whose teenage niece, Katie (Amber Tamblyn),
and several of her friends recently died under some
very odd circumstances. Seems they were all shacked
up at a remote cabin where they watched a video tape
together. When Rachel gets a hold of the videotape
she watches the quick images flash before her, the
phone rings, and a disembodied female voice says
"7 days."
From that point on, the movie begins counting down
each day. Rachel shows the tape to her ex-boyfriend
Noah (Martin Henderson) hoping for his advice. He
watches, and receives the same phone call warning.
But when her son Aidan (David Dorfman) accidently
watches the video, Rachel suddenly finds herself
in a race against time to investigate who or what
is behind the mysterious deaths. Realizing that
the fragmented images on the tape are actually a
message, Rachel and Noah follow the clues to a
horse farm and a dead girl named Samara (Daveigh
Chase).
Does Box-Office success mean that a film is good?
In the eyes of this reviewer that answer is a stern
NO. There is nothing overly scary about
The Ring, but I'll readily admit that I was
kept glued to the screen for the film's entire length
in hopes that there was a plausible explanation for
all the events that were happening. Please don't
make the same mistake I did. When you make it to
the end of the movie you are left only with the
unsatisfactory feeling that everything you just
watched is one big incoherent mess.
How is the transfer?
Hope you like the color green, because the entire
film seems to be colored in an off-greenish tone.
I'll admit that this stylish coloring did add a
certain amount of gloomish mood to the film. In
fact, the film is purposely made to look dark, but
fortunately, this transfer keeps its overly darkened
material well detailed. The visual polish evident
through the entire film serves as a quiet seduction
into the film's carefully orchestrated tricks. The
print looks absolutely pristine with excellent
color rendering and absolutely no background grain
or noise. In all, this is a fantastic effort.
The DVD offers a DTS track that delivers a nice
amount of dynamic range with lots of LFE punch that
underline the heightened (I am careful not to say
"scary") moments of the film. Center channel dialogue
is very clear and detailed. The rears do an admirable
job of delivering ambient effects, but I was a bit
disappointed that this DTS mix didn't have better
sound direction nor manage to envelope the entire
listening area.
Special Features
When was the last time you saw a collection of
supplements that were simply labeled Don’t Watch
This and Watch This?
I'm still scratchin' my noggin' over Don’t Watch
This, a never-before-seen short created by
director Gore Verbinski for this DVD release. It's
basically a 15-minute montage of what seems to be
randomly deleted scenes intertwined with that goofy
videotape footage. Oh the pain....the pain!
Look Here contains trailers for Ringu,
the film that inspired The Ring, as well as
additional trailers for Catch me if you Can
and 8 Mile.
Hey....how about including the film's theatrical
trailer!?
The only clever thing about this entire DVD is what
DreamWorks did with their opening FBI WARNING and
studio logo. Check that out and forget the rest!
Final Thoughts
Judging by the amount of teens I saw in line
today at Circuit City with a copy of The Ring
in their hand, I already realize that this film
is going to sell very well on DVD. Perhaps I am
just getting too old and cynical in my attitude
towards today's horror movies that certainly don't
scare the way they used to.
Rent it if you must, but don't buy it blindly.
Release Date: NOW
All screen captures have been further compressed.
They are for illustrative purposes only and do not
represent actual picture quality