The Ring Two

Everyone knows the story of The Ring. You watch this tape and your phone rings and some creepy little girl says "Seven Days" which means you have seven days left to live. In The Ring Two, it forgets that story. The movie focuses on Rachael (Naomie Watts) and her son Aidan (David Dorfman). Racheal and Aidan have left their home that they used to live in and to start fresh in Astoria, Oregon. It is 6 months after the events in the first movie. However, Racheal's resolve quickly turns to dread when evidence at a local crime scene including and unmarked video taped-seems familiar. Racheal realizes that the evil Samara is back.

The original Ring was scary and thrilling. The sequel isn't loaded with terror. But there are some scenes when I did get a bit terrified. Before, seeing it, I expected to be jumping up and down out of my seat and being really scared. The Ring Two is not a bad movie, I just expected a little more.

The movie trailers were promising. The premise was semi-promising. Oddly enough both the premise and the trailers were scarier than this sequel to The Ring. Yes, the original Japanese director returns and he conveys the images and symbolism very well, but he does not provide anything engaging here. The two movies do not seem to necessarily connect. It's almost as if they remade the first Ring with a few additions. There is not a lot of new material presented here. The movie tries to scare us by using either the same or similar events from the first. The ominous music playing throughout the film and the fact that this sequel was made so nonsensically are scarier than the movie itself. There are too many things that occur that you just have to accept without explanation. And then after the movie's done, you'll be left with plenty of questions including how the first one relates to this one. I cannot place some of those questions here without spoiling anything, so I'll leave that up to you. Okay, let's move away from the negative and talk about the few positives this film has. The acting is much better than the average horror film and, as stated before, the images are presented very well. The visuals are nice and you come to slightly care about some of the characters, although most of them do ridiculous things. Other than that, I cannot think of much else to say that is good. This movie was just disappointing. Do not watch this with high expectations unless you are easily scared and jump at the "sudden" music and scenes. The first Ring was good. It was different and well-made. I did not find it particularly scary, but bizarre. This just relies on music and jump surprises. Fear doesn't even come half circle in this film. If you liked the first Ring and expect to see much more about the story, you may be disappointed as well. But if you only want to see a different version of part one, then you may enjoy this sequel. Good luck =)

4.8/10 Stars

The Ring Two is a pretty good sequel for what it was, but it was not like the first one. I guess that is to be expected when you learn everything in the first movie, therefore it goes straight to the horror in the second movie. This was just about as creepy as the first, but the continuity between the two movies did not quite add up. For example, you do not automatically die in 7 days if you see the video but, if you can get someone else to watch it within that time, the curse is transfered over to them. Also, Samara (Kelly Stables), is not bound to the 7 days for those that have seen the tape in the original movie. She is nearly omnipotent, as the only place where you can talk and she can not hear is in your sleep. A little hard to make sense of, but the movie does a good job.

Rachel and Aidan Keller (Naomi Watts & David Dorfman) move to a small, new town to escape the horror of what they have just been through just 6 months earlier. Thinking they had destroyed the last copy of the tape and they were safe, somehow another copy has resurfaced in the small town they were in and Samara has killed yet again. When Rachel shows up at the scene and looks at the face, I assume to make sure it is the same as before, Samara had found her, and stalks her son, Aidan throughout the movie and eventually possesses him.

I can not really go too far into the story without giving a lot away, but there are many scenes which will always stand out and will no doubt be spoofed my movies like Scary Movie and others like it. Most notably, the deer scene was great. That made the movie for me, but there were others that were good, too. While I think this movie was not as good as the first, it does not make a complete mockery of itself either (like Jeepers Creepers 2). It is very good. 7.5/10

The Ring 2 isn't as bad as some people say it is, the plot is a little more simple than the first one and I admit that there are a few places in the movie that could've been better, but it's still a good movie. I like how the movie starts off in a similar way to the first film, since it gives the feeling of deja vu. After that there are some things that are a little to much like the first but they can be ignored with little effort. The story starts out really well as I said the plot is kind of simple but its set out so that it takes a while to see the whole picture. There are some parts with CGI effects that aren't needed and that will annoy some people but thankfully, there's not to many of those. Half way through it gets really good, you don't know whats happening and you don't know how they're going to stop it all you know is that Samara has come back but with unknown intentions. After that it gets a bit obvious and kinda hurried but who cares. To sum it all up I'd have to say it done quite well since the first film was hard to follow up on. See the film for your self, trust me, you won't regret it.

I'm not a horror fan at all, but got invited to this screening and decided to go see what all the hoopla was about. What I got was an interesting piece which I might sooner qualify as a supernatural thriller than a horror movie (but I guess that's what J-horror movies are). Sure, it's quite gross in a couple of places and there are a few heart-stopping moments as well, but what really impressed me was that the entire movie, from the first minute to the last, is filled with this weird kind of suspenseful energy. Even when literally nothing particularly frightening in itself is going on, it still feels «off», it's still unsettling, uncomfortable, on edge. And that for me was the strength of this movie. Not having seen Hideo Nakata's previous Ringu movies, I was pleasantly surprised to find out that he seems to be a master of creating an atmosphere scarier than any special-effect driven sequence could. All the actors did a good job as well – and Sissy Spacek's cameo was a nice touch – though I would have liked to have seen a bit more background to the Max-Rachel relationship. All in all, I predict a good show at the box-office for this one!