Good story, Not enough for a whole film

A Masterpiece!

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

RASEN is a weird and forgotten follow-up to RING, filmed at the same time but going in a very different direction to the official sequel, RING 2. RASEN expands on the philosophical plot-points raised by the first film and the novel on which it was based and as such is much more of a metaphysical journey with science fiction aspects. All of that doesn't really amount to much, though, in a film which is too low budget and fumbled for its own good.There are none of the traditional ghost story thrills here, or if they do appear then they're not very effective. The cast members go through the motions but there's little of the sense of drive or power that RING possessed. It all feels very dated in a late 1990s way. I think people forget the sheer intensity of the RING trilogy and in comparison to those films, RASEN is merely an oddball thriller and not a very engaging one either, unfortunately.

This film follows the Japanese version of the Ring known as Ringu. Where it follows I am not sure. The back of my box which is a collection of the Japanese Rings places it second, however the alternate title here suggests it was the fourth film. All I know is that this film is a sequel to Ringu, but a disappointing one. There are things that follow the first film, then things that are completely wrong and this one makes the mistake of trying to logically explain things and give reasons for what is happening. Kind of like the Phantasm series, the first one you wondered what the heck was going on and in the later installments they tried to explain everything and it just was not as intriguing anymore.The story starts out with a man autopsying a former colleague who was the father in the first film. This leads to the best scene in the movie as this autopsy is rather bloody. Too bad that the highlight of the film is like less than ten minutes in. This doctor lost a son and soon stumbles upon the cursed video tape. He begins seeing things, and it is not long until he has played the video. However, things completely go off track as they start introducing a sort of virus in this one seemingly dismissing the little girl all together. And it is not even a little girl this time! Yes, this film tries to scientifically explain things this time and it just does not work. Not for me anyway. It also changes the little girl into a woman. Maybe this was not the second installment and things were explained in the previous flicks, I only went by the order given me on the box, but I still hate the cause for all the deaths and stuff they give here.So, what we get is a sequel that changes things around, but still has the core from the original. It may be enjoyable for some, I enjoyed it up to a point, but I certainly thought the ending was very dull. I do hope the movie titled Ringu 2 is better than this one was.

Rasen is the original sequel to Ringu (1998). It begins where Ringu leaves off although it is in itself a self contained story with new characters who unfortunately encounter the will of Sadako Yamamura. The interesting thing about this movie is it was made at exactly the same time as Ringu. Both movies were put into production with different directors and creative teams in the hope that when audiences saw Ringu, they could then immediately go back to the cinema to see the sequel Rasen. Unfortunately this did not work as the source material upon which they are based have completely different tones, and the movies reflect this. Audiences were expecting more of the same creepy horror which Rasen does not have and ultimately Rasen was a failure at the box office and was subsequently shelved. It is however a fantastic movie, as the Koji Suzuki novel on which it was based was a fantastic novel ( Rasen, 1995)Admittedly it is not as scary or tense as Ringu, but it isn't supposed to be. While Ringu focuses on the supernatural elements of the cursed video tape, Rasen takes a more scientific view. Imagine Ringu crossed with CSI. It deals not with ghosts and curses but with viruses and forensics. It is more a character study and is slow and deep, but in no way is this detrimental to the continuing Ringu story. It's simply a different perspective and a welcome one.I'm not sure that this movie should be categorised as it so often has, as a poor attempt at Japanese horror. It is however a clever, engaging example of Japanese cinema. The performances are excellent, the pacing is perfect and the ending is satisfyingly creepy and thought provoking. In fact it sets up the possibility of a movie adaptation of the third novel in the Ring series, Loop which takes the story even further from the supernatural into the realms of virtual reality.Rasen deserves more credit than it has been given, it is vastly superior to the "official" sequel Ringu 2, which was merely a rehash of the original movie. Definitely worth watching!

Often I can be somewhat of a movie snob, especially when it comes to the realm of horror, but this movie was godawful. No wonder the American sequel took creative liberties when making the Ring 2, it was either make a movie that involved ferocious deer, or emulate this Japanese bomb. I can understand a psychological thriller, but this movie offered such a convoluted and ridiculous plot line that it was unbelievable and thus flaccid and weak. The only disturbing part was the fact that they spent money on a movie that suggested there was such a thing as an "optic infection"...you watch something and you get a virus from it? I'm not a doctor, but I'm pretty sure that's not possible...ever. There wasn't even poorly animated CGI bits, to make the movie at least amusing. Just a lot of talking, no action, and no intelligence whatsoever. The ending had somewhat of a twist, but not nearly enough to makeup for 2 hours of sheer boredom.