Yumi’s group of friends mysteriously die after receiving a phone call from their own number—coming from the future. In the voicemail, they can hear themselves die. Yumi herself receives an MMS showing an eerie image of herself with a strange creature crawling toward her. Fearing for her life, she begins investigating the origins of these bizarre death traps in the hope of breaking the curse.
Yet another Japanese film that bites off more than it can chew by riding the Ringu wave. Even more disappointing is that Takashi Miike allows himself to be swayed by commercial forces.
When will Japanese filmmakers realize that Japanese girls with long black hair and unnatural movements were only scary once or twice? And I’m talking about Ringu, because after that, every horror film has included these girls crawling out of closets and floorboards. Enough already. It worked in Ringu, but Ju-On, Kakashi, Kairo, Dark Water, and so on can take a long nap because this is plagiarism at its worst. As if that weren’t enough, all these films insist on incorporating haunted technology.
Japanese filmmakers have received a lot of praise for their ability to create great horror films. But now we’re seeing the downside—a flood of films that are about as original as contestants in a look-alike competition. That being said, originality isn’t everything in film; even unoriginal movies can be enjoyable if executed well. But here, One Missed Call runs into its second major problem—it’s slow as syrup.
The film drags on for nearly two hours, attempting to build atmosphere and introduce a slightly complex plot, but it fails catastrophically as the story becomes increasingly ridiculous. Miike’s direction is solid at times, but it collapses under the weight of lackluster effects and cheap jump scares. The film’s star, Kou Shibasaki, known from Battle Royale and Kakashi, delivers a decent performance, and I understand her high status in Japan. But neither Kou Shibasaki nor Miike can save this film, leaving us with yet another long and tedious ghost story.
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