Sadako vs. Kayako
February 25, 2016 5:15 PM   Subscribe

What started as an April Fool's joke on the Ju-On website is now becoming an actual movie. Two of the biggest Japanese horror franchises (リング / Ringu and じゅおん / Ju-On) are combining forces to make Sadako vs Kayako.

Ringu / The Ring, based on a novel by Koji Suzuki, first premiered in 1998 and spawned a prequel (Ring 0: Birthday) and two separate sequel timelines (one with Ring 2, and another with Rasen / Sadako 3D / Sadako 2 3D). There were also 2 American remakes, The Ring (which was the first American remake of a Japanese horror movie) and The Ring 2. The original Ringu has a 97% on the Tomatometer and was (is?) the highest grossing Japanese horror movie.

Ju-On started as a couple of V-Cinema movies (The Curse and The Curse 2) before hitting box offices as Ju-On: The Grudge in 2002. Since then, there have been 5 Japanese sequels (Ju-On: The Grudge 2, Ju-On: White Ghost, Ju-On: Black Ghost, Ju-On: The Beginning of the End, and Ju-On: The Final Curse) and 3 American movies (The Grudge / The Grudge 2 / The Grudge 3).

While Ringu and the wave of horror movies that followed/imitated it brought "J-Horror" to the west, it was also part of a new trend in Japanese horror that started in the V-Cinema / direct to video world. Unlike 80's Japanese horror, which was very focused on gore (much like American slasher films), there was more of the atmospheric horror that featured in early Japanese horror (movies like Ghost of Yotsuya, Onibaba or Kwaidan).

The most obvious comparison, Freddy v Jason, was the highest-grossing entry in either of those respective series at the time (it has been nudged out by the 2010 Nightmare on Elm Street).
posted by thefoxgod (33 comments total) 12 users marked this as a favorite
 
The framing device should be an American, running from something, winding up in the wrong house in Japan, and who pops in a VHS tape that he thinks is an instructional video he bought on how to order takeout in Japanese...

Scene: The monster slowly drags herself above the stone ring... Waiting for her is the American, holding a glittering tanegashima.) ASH: WELL. WELL. WELL.
posted by Slap*Happy at 5:30 PM on February 25, 2016 [20 favorites]


Tell me it won't be as much of an insult to either parent as Alien v Predator.
posted by Bringer Tom at 5:31 PM on February 25, 2016


None of the sequels to either original were anything to write home about so I really shouldn't be excited for this, but... I am totally excited.
posted by gloriouslyincandescent at 5:36 PM on February 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


There was also a Korean remake of Ringu called The Ring Virus, starring Bae Doona. Unfortunately it's not as good as the American remake.
posted by cazoo at 5:42 PM on February 25, 2016 [1 favorite]


I sort of love it. I mean, it's just sort of "why the hell not?" and it seems, from the trailer, to strike the right tone between "we know what this is" to "we're still trying to make a horror movie." I'd watch it.
posted by darksong at 5:53 PM on February 25, 2016 [3 favorites]


I'm for this, but only if it takes place in the house from Hausu. And then the sequel can involve the kids from Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service teaming up with the guy from Mail (again) to take down all the ghosts.
posted by tobascodagama at 6:01 PM on February 25, 2016 [12 favorites]


We're a few years too late to do it properly as Sadako vs. Kayako vs. Guitar Wolf.
posted by delfin at 6:15 PM on February 25, 2016 [9 favorites]


I watched Ju-On and thought it was incomprehensible, and thought "well, I don't speak Japanese, so maybe I'm just not getting something that should be obvious". So I watched The Grudge, and... welp, not so much.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:22 PM on February 25, 2016


Is this a bit like the billboard in the deserted Times Square in I Am Legend turning into a real movie nine years later (and, weirdly, the same year Will Smith winds up playing a supervillain in a movie with Batman in it)?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:30 PM on February 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


One problem with Ju-On: The Grudge is it was actually the third movie, yet for most people it was the first they watched, so while they explained some of the backstory I think it was missing some elements. And they've since kind of retconned/altered it in the sequels.

It also helps to be familiar with Onryō (more). (Who are not exclusively female, but are commonly/mostly women who were abused and/or murdered by their lovers, like the very well known Oiwa).

One thing that will be interesting is whether this really a "vs"... unlike slasher films, the humans in these don't really fight back. So I don't think Sadako or Kayako have really faced _opposition_ before...
posted by thefoxgod at 6:59 PM on February 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


Ju-On: The Grudge doesn't make a whole lot of sense on its own, but I feel like it doesn't have to. It's about the irrationality of violence and the rippling effects it has going forwards (and backwards?) through time and space. It's like a doll with too many strange limbs that resists our attempts to dress it in Barbie clothes.

I remember watching it in the theater, waiting for the mystery to unravel, and the last shot was of the unnamed ghost murderer, unable to move past the brutality of his actions, killing over and over again and getting angrier each time, and the film wasn't horrifying anymore; it transcended horror and terror and moved into fatalism, which as many survivors will tell you is an oddly reassuring state of mind. Oh, I thought, so this is how it all ends.
posted by infinitewindow at 7:01 PM on February 25, 2016 [6 favorites]


I just couldn't track what was happening when (which I don't usually have a problem with in nonlinear films) and usually had a hard time telling exactly what was supposed to be happening and why. That made it kind of dreamlike, I guess, but not compelling- that's a hard two things to combine, I think. The only thing I've seen which does it well is Junji Ito's "The Town Without Streets".
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:23 PM on February 25, 2016


Very yes.
posted by comealongpole at 7:34 PM on February 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


We're a few years too late to do it properly as Sadako vs. Kayako vs. Guitar Wolf.

RIP Billy. But the band is actually still together and touring with a new Bass Wolf...
posted by tobascodagama at 8:30 PM on February 25, 2016


"Now Kiko's spirit will live in the happy frog!"
posted by Artw at 9:14 PM on February 25, 2016 [15 favorites]


Metafilter: a doll with too many strange limbs that resists our attempts to dress it in Barbie clothes.
posted by otherchaz at 9:49 PM on February 25, 2016


Translating the titles, just for fun:

禁断の領域へ
into forbidden territory

呪いのビデオ
cursed video

呪われた家
cursed house

邦画ホラー
史上最大の
Japanese film horror
Historical biggest

歴史的
プロジェクト
Historic project

遂に交わる
[Sadako and Kayako] Finally meet
posted by kurumi at 11:34 PM on February 25, 2016 [4 favorites]


Tell me it won't be as much of an insult to either parent as Alien v Predator.

Or Freddy Vs Jason.

(So, basically, be careful what you wish for.)
posted by Mezentian at 12:34 AM on February 26, 2016


I have never seen the Grudge, but I remember watching both Ringu and The Ring with my old boyfriend. We agreed that The Ring was a scarier film but only Ringu actually made any sense.
posted by Peregrine Pickle at 1:19 AM on February 26, 2016


Dear Diary,

SUCH a tough day. Accidentally watched a cursed video in a cursed house (built on an ancient Indian burial ground) while playing with Lemarchand's box with this kid from my class, Damien Thorn, who drove me home from Camp Crystal Lake (oh and we accidentally hit this pedestrian! But I think he's dead???) and then at midnight we went trick-or-treating down Ocean Avenue 'cause it's Halloween, and when we get to number 112 this weird guy looks through the keyhole and tell us that our parents burnt the school caretaker to death years ago and then he gives us this wet Mogwai that's eaten all his candy, so we walk back through the forest with it trying out our new video cameras (you know, the forest where all those kids were kidnapped back in the 40's) and we find this cabin in the woods and this guy opens the door and he's like, "Oh Hi I'm Louis, are you here to interview me?" and the WHOLE TIME I'm just thinking to myself: "OMG ... isn't it purge night?" and then my phone starts ringing and it's someone telling me I'm "gonna need a bigger boat". Pretty weird night, but at least no-one tried to talk to me about Kevin.

Yours truly,

Regan MacNeil
posted by the quidnunc kid at 1:45 AM on February 26, 2016 [10 favorites]


Hope there's a wrestling scene like in Freddy vs Jason (and kinda in Alien vs Predator)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 2:10 AM on February 26, 2016


Yoko Ono at 0:37.

Fuck, I've never screamed so loud ...
posted by oheso at 3:40 AM on February 26, 2016


(which was the first American remake of a Japanese horror movie)

I realize Gojira probably doesn't count as a horror movie but I still feel like needless pedantry so here you go.
posted by shakespeherian at 6:32 AM on February 26, 2016 [1 favorite]


Am I a bad person for hoping the movie is;

Sadako: "So." takes a sip of tea.
Kayoko: "So..."
Sadako. "So are you seeing anyone right now?"
Kayoko; "No." takes a nibble from watercress sandwich "And you?"
Sadako: crosses her legs, looks away. "No, right now I'm concentrating on my career."
Kayoko: "Must be nice to have a career outside the home."
Sadako: "It is."
There is a long silence as they sip tea and scowl at each other. Outside a crow caws, and a bamboo deer scarer goes "Donk".
posted by happyroach at 10:38 AM on February 26, 2016 [22 favorites]


That is a thousand times better than what this movie probably will be.
posted by tobascodagama at 10:43 AM on February 26, 2016


It's always seemed to me that the best defense against all these soggy Japanese ghost ladies would probably just be putting hair traps over all your drains.

We agreed that The Ring was a scarier film but only Ringu actually made any sense.

I still hold that the American version is a much better film *and* story - the implications are made in the US version, but not spelled out explicitly thus leaving some steps to the fevered imagination. In the Ringu series, the backhistory is exhaustively spelled out, and is (and I say this as a fan of Japanese horror/weird cinema) largely ludicrous to the point of stupidity.
posted by FatherDagon at 2:26 PM on February 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


I thought Ringu was better - The Ring is just someone's ring, but Ringu will ring YOU.

Also the actual video tape in Ringu is better, way creepier. You should watch it. Within the next 7 days. Please.
posted by the quidnunc kid at 3:33 PM on February 26, 2016 [8 favorites]


American The Ring has a videotape that's basically a Marylin Manson fans idea of a scary video.
posted by Artw at 4:30 PM on February 26, 2016 [3 favorites]


The Ring is a way better movie than Ringu, full stop. But I never got the appeal of any version of The Grudge. The croaking sound is very creepy, though.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:13 AM on February 27, 2016


Ringu is, unfortunately, a product of its time, shot on video, with pretty awful effects that have never failed to take me entirely out of the movie. The Ring was, I thought, a pretty solid updating, and scared the bejesus out of me when I out the dvd in, then walked away to make popcorn, not knowing that the auto playing menu video was essentially a large chunk of the video itself, and me, alone in my apartment, with almost all the lights off...

Juon vs the Grudge is a bit ore difficult for me. The American one captures a feeling of horror quite well. The film was repeatedly genuinely frightening to me in ways that Juon never got to me, but then again, The Grudge had a much more narrow focus, leaving out some key elements that Juon used to show the sprawl of the curse and how it would taint anyone who came into any contact, no matter how remote (the side bit with the daughter of the policeman, for example). The the Grudge left some of those things out made it not as overwhelmingly despairing, which I think is where Juon is the better film: Juon is despair, knowing it will never end.
posted by Ghidorah at 8:31 AM on February 27, 2016 [3 favorites]


The Ring is a way better movie than Ringu, full stop

Argumentum ad punctus!
posted by the quidnunc kid at 3:21 AM on February 28, 2016


Why is this even still a question? The Japanese version has the better videotape, better sound design, and Rie Inō. And "samara" is a spinny seed pod.
posted by thetortoise at 3:33 AM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


Also Ringu is actually a true story, so I don't know how America just ripped it off like it also happened to them too. It's cultural imperialism gone mad.
posted by the quidnunc kid at 5:54 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]


« Older One can deal with the world through puppets   |   Start Your Art Journey Today Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments