Le Cercle : Rings

Seven days! A simple phrase that struck terror in our hearts oh so many years ago. Certainly, you know I'm talking of The Ring, the horror movie about a death delivering video tape certain to scare you to death. Samara's tale has fallen on to the backburner for some time, but like the cursed video, the series has resurfaced to the modern world to once more have you cowering at your screens. Will Rings live up to the potential? Robbie K here, once more sharing his opinions on yet another film. Let's get started.

LIKES: • Decent acting • Nice blend into the modern era • Strong story for a horror

Summary: Okay, this movie is certainly not going to win awards for best performance, but Rings' cast has some skill in their performances of college kids plagued by an evil spirit. Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz and Alex Roe are the leads of this tale, doing a great job of balancing romance and detective work, finally a power couple who wasn't annoying. And Johnny Galecki trades one nerd role for another, though this time his scientific qualities had a little darker twist to the mix. Overall, the cast gets a pat on the back for establishing some good characters to hook on to. Yet the major things this reviewer liked involved the story components of the movie. Rings has jumped into the modern area, dropping the outdated VHS tapes for modern day MP4 files. It will help bridge the generation gaps, and add a new element that the other installments were missing. And the story was much stronger than I anticipated. Rings has more mystery to it, trying to find the answers to the elusive mystery of Samara's origins. Where it fits in the grand scheme of things is a little up in the air, but at least there is some character development and drama to spice things up. And as for the ending, it too is a little ambiguous, providing some delightfully dark closure, but still leaving it open for future installments. Not the strongest finish, but also not bad.

DISLIKES: • Scare Factor at A Low • Some plot elements lackluster • Not the same Ring

Summary: Rings story may be on target, but the scare factor still didn't reach the same levels that the first movie was able to achieve. This installment resorted to jump out scare moments, mainly trying to make you jump with sudden loud noises and hallucinations appearing from out of nowhere. Many of these moments weren't well timed, and to be honest many of the objects just weren't scary. Think of the first film and how creepy everything was, the unknown always teasing you until something sprung out of nowhere. All that was very diluted in this installment. Even though they finally show you how she kills her victims, the team didn't quite make it as horrifying as I thought it would be (think ghost rider's soul stare without the flashy fire). Rings was lacking this element, and had more of a mystery theme to it than an actual horror. In addition, there were also some plot elements that didn't shine as much as they wanted. For this reviewer, there is still some questions they still haven't fully answered that you have to draw yourself. The bottom line of the dislikes is that Rings didn't quite hit the same level the first movie had all those years ago.

The VERDICT:

In conclusion, Ring is not so much a horror movie in this round, but a mystery film about uncovering the origins of Samara. While the cast is decent, the story is mostly thought out, and we have some answer, it still didn't feel like the Ring series we've come to know. If you are looking for a movie to scare the pants off of you, sorry this isn't the film to do it. And you can probably guess, but yours truly doesn't recommend this one for the theater and implores you to wait until it hits home rental stands. Only people who might enjoy this one in theater are those who care about the story element of the movie, but I still think you can wait for home (I mean we have been waiting twelve years for this one right?).

My scores are:

Drama/Horror: 6.5 Movie Overall: 5.0

...to not waste yours.

Remember the writers strike of 1988?

How bad a good pie recipe is without a cook? How poorly your car runs with no gasoline? How your puppy seems lacklustre and not at all playful since he died?

There was more suspense on Teletubbies when I didn't see the green one for a few seconds. Remember Duckman? I did, after I struggled thru 46 minutes of this I borrowed my parents VCR and watched it instead.

Rings is not a bad film , but it's just you can't call it strong horror Maybe Thriller or Mystery .. The story is good and could have been served better to increase the scary content of it . I consider it a good continuation of the Ring series Although I'm missing Naomi Watts . Acting was okay . Music and Picture were fine ..

Overall it's not as bad as you might hear , and not better than the first two parts ..

'RINGS': Three Stars (Out of Five)

The third installment in the American supernatural horror franchise, following 2002's 'THE RING' and 2005's 'THE RING TWO'; the series is based on the 1998 Japanese horror movie 'RINGU'. This sequel has a college student, and his girlfriend, trying to survive the curse of Samara Morgan; which haunts you for a week, before death, after watching a mysterious video tape. The film was directed by F. Javier Gutierrez, and it was written by David Loucka, Jacob Aaron Estes and Akiva Goldsman. It stars Matilda Lutz, Alex Roe, Johnny Galecki and Vincent D'Onofrio. The movie has been a hit at the Box Office, so far, but (of course) it's received mostly negative reviews from critics, and fans alike. I found it to be pretty disappointing.

A college professor, named Gabriel (Galecki), discovers the curse of Samara Morgan; after buying an old VCR at a garage sale, with a mysterious tape in it. He creates a college experiment out of the curse; where he assigns students to watch the tape, and then he finds them someone else to show it to (which saves their lives). Holt (Roe) is one new student that's unlucky enough to get the assignment. When Holt's girlfriend, Julia (Lutz), doesn't hear from him, she comes looking for him.

The film starts out pretty promising, and it's creepy enough (like the others), but it loses it's way pretty quickly. There's definitely some cool, and somewhat frightening, scenes in it; but they're mostly all in the first half of the movie. This sequel is definitely not as original, or as memorable, as it's predecessors; but it's worst crime is that it's just boring. The first half is mildly amusing, but the second half is definitely a bore!

The movie was better than it had any right to be, but it didn't try to do anything new. I actually enjoyed the mystery aspect of the film, but it kind of failed as a scary movie, as it wasn't scary at all and was filled with cheap fake jump scares. The acting from the two main people isn't bad, but you can tell they got the parts just because they were pretty. This movie seems much more of a sequel to the original movie The Ring, forgetting most of the nonsense from The Ring 2. Rings also seems to take more inspiration from the original Japanese films, where a lot more is learned about Samara's birth parents.

From the trailers, I thought that this movie might have a lot more stuff with social media, but other than a few things, this movie could have taken place a decade ago. The only thing to show that the film's in the present is that they copy & paste video files, and they use smart phones as flashlights. Overall, the film isn't horrible, but it also isn't very good, I definitely wouldn't recommend it.

If you want to see my full review in video form you can check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JstAEbfzXwI