can get your hands on when you rent it, and that you watch it at night in the dark...if you want the full effect. Also, make sure you rent it on DVD and NOT cassette...you know, just to be safe ;

superior in many ways, having none of the flaws but all of the assets and then some.I'm going to do something unusual and examine the differences between the two films by detailing just a portion of one scene present in both. I think the examination reveals why the U.S. film is superior. The scene is the tail end of the opening, which results in a death. Here's how it goes in Ringu: Tomoko Oishi's Yuko Takeuchi television mysteriously turns on to a baseball game as she's looking inside the refrigerator. She looks up, above the door, surprised. We get a reverse shot. We can see the television through frosted glass in the next room. A steadicam follows her from behind, peeking around the corner with her. We cut back to her face, which is relatively expressionless. We go back to a rear shot and see her walk to the remote and shut off the television. She turns around and walks back to the kitchen, pouring herself a drink. We cut to a lower-angled closer shot. We hear a noise. A subtle fear crosses her face. She trembles. Cut to a close shot from over her shoulder. Suddenly, she turns around, frightened. The frame freezes and quickly turns a blue/gray-tinted "negative" color. Here's how it goes in The Ring: Katie Embry Amber Tamblyn is in the kitchen, just about to drink, when the television turns on by itself to static. She stops dead in her tracks, her glass just barely touching her lips. Cut to a close up of her slowly turning her head and looking at the television, horrified. Almost achingly slowly, the camera creeps around the corner to show us the television. We see Katie look for any sign of an intruder. She sees the remote on the chair, but no one is around. She hurriedly shuts off the television, then walks away, trying to rationalize the event. Before she can get out of the room, the television turns on again. She stops again and turns even slower. The camera slowly creeps into a medium shot of Katie, with the television and its static reflected in a pane of glass. She runs over and puts her face right next to the television. We see this from a fantastically skewed angle, which distorts the television screen, sticking one end right in our face. We get an insert of Katie yanking the plug. Sparks shoot out. Back to the skewed angle, but now the screen is blank. We circle around slightly. Suddenly there's a noise from the kitchen. Katie gasps and turns around. Slowly, she peeks into the kitchen, just in time to see the refrigerator door open by itself. She runs to shut it, now breathing heavily. She mutters to herself and begins looking around with a very subtle panic on her face. As she quickly turns towards the hallway, the camera rapidly changes focus. We cut to an interesting overhead angle on the stairway. Katie appears, peeking around the corner. She calls for her friend Becca. She trots up the stairs. We cut to a beautiful, extremely low angle of the upstairs hallway, which exaggerates the perspective. As we see Katie reach the top of the stairs, we also see water slowly flowing into the hall from beneath a door. The camera stays at the low angle until Katie reaches the water. We cut to a close up. She's scared and bewildered, then trembling. We get an extreme close up of the door handle as her hand comes gradually into the focal range. She grabs the handle. Another close-up of her face. Cut to the interior of the room--her bedroom. Katie flings open the door, horrified. With a series of extremely fast cuts, we see a snippet of the Ring video on the television set in her bedroom. Cut back to Katie. A super fast zoom to her distorted, horrific face. Then back to the Ring video in a series of quick cuts, before the entire screen goes to static.The point here isn't that the U.S. version is longer. Rather, it's to exemplify the attention to craft, from technical to emotional aspects. Verbinski's pacing is much more deliberate and varied, creating intense suspense. Bojan Bazelli's cinematography is breathtakingly beautiful. There is an obsession with details, from those that integrate and propel the story to those that are artistically striking. The construction is much more complex, but every shot is analyzed for relevance. Every angle exists for a reason. The ornate aesthetics amp up the effect of the story. This approach isn't unique to the opening scene, but occurs throughout the film, including the famed "Ring video" itself. The music is also better here, and is better integrated into the film. The performances are excellent, with Aidan Keller David Dorfman just as creepy and disturbing as the antagonist, Samara Morgan Daveigh Chase . As would be expected for U.S. audiences, Verbinski includes a lot more exposition in his film, working in explanatory material from Ringu 2 as well as new material exploring Samara's history. It works well here, as the story is much tighter. Everything eventually fits together like pieces of a puzzle, and it gives the Ring video and the varied settings of the film more relevance.

personal opinion the producers of The Ring have made the story a bit deeper and of course with the music and special effects scarier.A particular thing worth mentioning is the work done by the child actor David Dorfman playing the role of Aidan . My personal opinion is that he has done a very good job. And Ehren Kruger, in his script for the movie has given a major role to Aidan as opposed to lesser important role given to Aidan's Japanese counterpart.Full credit to the Ring's makers for a very fine adaptation of the original Ringu. And yes, a small word of advice for those who have not seen the real Daveigh Chase playing Samara . After seeing this movie, do look up on the net for a picture of hers and make the comparison! And do try and watch Ringu as well. A very respectable movie indeed.A good story, nice scares, decent acting and smooth direction! Enjoy the movie!

lot has been said about Ringu, the work from which this was adapted for American cinema, and inevitable subsequent comparisons made, however, that is certainly NOT the case. That argument is moot, as this work was based on the novel, "The Ring" by Koji Suzuki, so if you want something to which an honest comparison may be made, I would suggest you read the book, and leave Ringu where it belongs. Personally, I found the American adaptation much more to my liking than Ringu.This is one twisted little creep-fest! It rates an 8.7/10 from...the Fiend :.

However, I loved the mystery and weirdness of it.It begins a bit like your typical American nonsense with two teenage girls chatting and the conversation coming around to a videotape that is supposed to kill people that watch it. My first thought was: how "urban legend"ish and ridiculous!! However, as the film went on, it clearly had a darker, more powerful and very much more thought provoking aspect. The images on the videotape itself are so "nightmarish", in that disjointed and freaky way that real nightmares can be. They really got under my skin anyway and I actually came to believe in the power the tape had to kill. You wonder how on earth Rachel is going to escape the same fate as the others and I felt real horror and despair on her discovery that Aidan has also watched the tape.One thing that I think really robs horror films of their ultimate "horror" value is when you come to the explanation/discovery of what's behind it all at the end. I thought the film had let itself down with a typical, rationalised ending. I was very pleasantly surprised with the horrifying twist that developed and I loved the eerie "non-ending" ending - it left me really freaked out and actually believing that the whole thing might be real after all. It is wonderful, psychologically terrifying stuff and I defy anyone to watch it and forget it - I am still thinking about it and giving myself the shivers months later! I won't give any film 10/10, as this is the ultimate and I am always challenging for there to be an even better film out there this film does exist and is Ringu if everyone else's comments are anything to go by . I give it a superior "must see" 9/10.

gloomy and atmospheric, which enhanced the mood. Naomi Watts portrayed Rachel perfectly, her emotions are believable and haunting. So if you are looking for a horror flick to watch on Friday night, be sure to watch The Ring, just make sure to watch it at night with the lights off.

the reporter has to solve the mystery or in seven days as a phone call tells them they will die. Some of the problems for me included the girl in the mental institution...you never find out why she is there or how she knows things. Also, the little boy has some physic I know this is spelled wrong powers that are never fully explained and at one point you wonder why didn't the boy say what he knew earlier. There are a couple of other little things, but all in all it was a good movie...now I just have to see what happens to me at the end of the week.

isolated in the middle of an empty feel. These images by themselves wouldn't be able to generate anything remotely resembling fear, but it's not the images. It's the relative calm and oddity of these pictures that leads to a feeling of unrest, a feeling that something more sinister is lurking just out of sight.This is Gore Verbinski's best movie. Period. I liked all the Pirates of the Caribbean movies a lot, too, but none of them come remotely close to achieving the upper echelons of their respective genres, as the Ring did, at least in my opinion. And honestly,perhaps most terrifying of all...is just seeing-her. With the long dark hair hanging ominously over her face, so no expression is visible.This movie is relentless. Something is always waiting in the dark, around the next turn. And then just when you think it's over...the movie hits full throttle. The pacing starts off quickly, and just continues to pick up speed. The Ring is the definition of the phrase "Never a dull moment."This is another movie to watch alone, in the dark, just like Alien. The difference-once Alien is over, you can say the terror was long in the future, on an isolated spaceship. The Ring is here and now. And with nothing stopping her, that cold-hearted terror, it seems just within the realm of possibility that she is coming up behind you now, as you read this, about to strike...

surrealism will die.The characters in the ring investigate this, and come upon some familiar tropes of the ghost story and of things like sentience I got a particular feeling and connection back to the Shining, no pun intended , but Verbinski's intent is to grip the viewer in a story that keeps to itself very well, is filmed without the gimmicks of, for example, Michael Bay's productions of remake-horror crap, and features actors that can make us believe this material. As with other superior ghost-story horror movies this decade like the Orphanage, it appreciates what is possible in just lighting a room, in letting a character take time to see things and experience them in a visceral manner so that we can as well, and Verbinski and his write bring on images that are inescapable i.e. the horse on the ship, the girl crawling out of the TV and going across the room .It's a crafty piece of slick Hollywood horror, and it's intrigued me enough to go back to the unseen source material, which is the best a remake can do aside from its potential re-watchability. 8.5/10