Year: 2017
Director: F. Javier Gutiérrez
Starring: Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz, Alex Roe, Johnny Galecki & Vincent D’Onofrio
Written by Louie Fecou
Fans of the horror genre are generally on a roller coaster ride when it comes to new movies. They veer wildly from brilliant to absurd, and i’m afraid as far as Rings is concerned, absurd immediately springs to mind.
It’s a shame really, as The Ring, well the original Japanese version, is a truly terrifying experience, and to be fair, the America re shoot was pretty passable too. The sequel tried hard to keep the franchise afloat, and this outing buries it deeper than Samara ever was.
The limp acting and direction left aside, the plot just dosen’t seem to know what to do with itself. At first we are led down the path of ancient curse being utilized by the miscast Johnny Galecki as university professor Gabriel, for his own insidious experiments, but when they get tired of that plot, it reverts to a re hash of previous outings with cursed teens trying to solve the secret of the ring to survive. In fact the original iconic video curse now morphs into some kind of prophecy for our protagonist Julia to unravel in a series of unscary and hackneyed set pieces.
The film drags itself to it’s obvious conclusion in much the same way that Samara drags herself from the well, and the plot devices used to try and add extra layers to the story are signposted better than most UK motorways are.
Spoilers
Vincent D’Onofrio plays the local blind priest that is so obviously the key player in the films lame conclusion, and I wonder after his star turn in Daredevil as Wilson Fisk, if taking the role of a blind man here was done for irony alone.
This film is slow, messy and silly and fans of the original material would be better served watching the original.
After the equally disappointing Bye Bye Man, we are still waiting for a horror film in 2017 that does what it’s supposed to do, scare us.
Louie’s rating: 3 out of 10
