Dateline Region 1, March 10,2003:
Terror in Your TV: Ringu and The Ring on DVD
The Ring, DVD. Directed by Gore Verbinski. Dreamworks, 2003.
Ringu, DVD. Directed by Hideo Nakata. Dreamworks, 2003.
On March 4, 2003, Dreamworks released on DVD its successful Fall 2002 horror flick The Ring and the original Japanese movie that inspired Verbinski's US blockbuster, Ringu. Fans of the horror genre who own DVD players purchased in droves. DVDPlanet.Com, formerly partnered with KenCranes.Com and now owned by Image--yep the studio, ran out of stock for both movies from preorders alone by March 3 (orders placed prior to the release date). Though the site has since restocked the American movie in both wide- and full screen, Ringu currently remains out of stock. The same is currently true for SamGoody.Com and its corporate affiliates Suncaost.Com and MediaPlay.Com (Sorry fellow Replay members, you'll have to keep phoning around to see if anyone has a copy remaining). The Japanese movie even sold well here in the small town of Starkville, MS where I reside. Though our local Sam Goody was the only local merchant to offer even a small stock of Ringu for sale, the store sold out not long after the March 4th release date, and The Ring was moving steadily off the shelves. Ringworld reports that The Ring sold over two million units on its first day of release.
While the simultaneous release of The Ring and Ringu on DVD will give viewers a much improved version of the Japanese original, neither DVD offers much in the way of extras. The Ring is available in both wide screen and full screen formats. Its menu is as sufficiently creepy as the movie itself and features the scene from the videotape of the spinning lone chair. The DVD's only extra features are a trailer for Ringu and what turns out to be deleted scenes from The Ring. The deleted scenes are featured under the menu choice that warns the viewer don't look, and so are not obviously present until the viewer decides to explore that menu option despite the warning. The scenes are separated by snippets of the dreaded deadly video. At first, it looks as though the video bits are part of the sequence of scenes, but by the end of the session, its obvious that the video bits and pieces were used to simply separate the various short deleted scenes and to add padding since the deleted sections are relatively short. While DVD fans love deleted scene extras, this style of editing is merely chaotic, and no notes or commentary are present to explain the thinking and purpose behind the scenes. This section is thus nothing more than eye candy and adds little to the DVD experience of the film. DVD fans don't simply like extras, we like extras with substance.
Ringu in its DVD incarnation (wide screen only) offers nothing in the way of extras except for the trailer for The Ring. This reviewer appreciates the DVD producers placing the trailers for the two movies on alternate discs, requiring the viewer to own or view both DVD's to see both trailers. Such production is an apt homage to The Ring's true origins and ensures an enduring media link between the two. Viewers will appreciate the fact that they can view a very nice copy of Ringu instead of those badly produced VCD bootlegs that play like worn out VHS copies made from an old TV and stick to the point of crashing one's own DVD player. Subtitles are used instead of dubbing for this production, but the English for the subtitles is a much better translation than the contraband fans have had to order from Canada thus far. So while the copy is nicer to watch, the viewer will still have to deal with the distraction of reading subtitles while trying to absorb all of the visuals.
For the content of The Ring, see my review of it on the big screen at http://www.lsu.edu/necrofile/ring7.html. As with much Asian horror, Ringu is less gory and more abstract. Viewers who did not like the lack of a detailed and rational explanation by the end of The Ring will be even more disappointed with Ringu. But these viewers are falling prey to the current trend in horror film to explain away anything scary. Ringu and its progeny hearken back to a primal element of the horror genre, the unknown. By the end of Ringu, we know as much about Sadako as we do about her US counterpart Samara. Both are unflinchingly evil and have the roots of their very existence in the supernatural. Ringu's plotline is of course close to that of The Ring, with the exception of the farm setting, which is a US creation, and the fact that the estranged father figure is psychic as well and has a more intimate knowledge of Sadako's background. Her mother is legend in the community of those who have the gift of ESP. Ringu's final solution is as spooky as The Ring's. The mothers in both films must save their sons by getting another person to watch the dread video, and their mechanisms for accomplishing this ensure the viewer has a satisfying dose of horror at the end of each film. While the solution in The Ring could conceivably only involve an acquaintance or a stranger (a possibility enhanced by the deleted scenes), the mother in Ringu relies on traditional values of home and family, and thus evokes an adequate level of horror in the audience.
Much more could have been done with these DVD productions; much that DVD fans not only expect as a staple of the product and much more that would have enthralled fans of these two movies. Aside from the usual audio commentary track, it would be absolutely wonderful to also get to hear each director do commentary on the other's movie. Surely Nakata has opinions about the US movie that spawned an appreciable fandom for his Ringu works here in the US, and viewers want an in-depth feel for what elements of Ringu inspired Verbinski. If Dreamworks is simply planning to release more than one DVD product of these films to make money a la Lord Of The Rings, this reviewer recommends commentary tracks from both directors for each movie. Indeed, such multiple commentary tracks would ensure future releases are truly worth the purchase price. Additionally, inclusion of an uninterrupted clip of the deadly video from each movie is a must, and would be even better if it includes the final climax scene where Samara/Sadako each climb out of the well and move into the TV screen. Currently fans do not have ready access to such a clip, not even on the official movie and fan-based websites.
Don't have your copy yet? Never fear. As mentioned earlier, the various DVD sellers online have acquired more stock of The Ring, but as usual wide screen copies tend to sell out first. Wal Mart has numerous copies of The Ring; one can even find them showing up in various areas of the store as other customers chicken out and leave them laying about, and that makes Samara and the stock clerk angry (bad movie viewer, you must die). Amazon.Com and BarnesandNoble.Com still have Ringu in stock as of today, and of course some folks are very willing to sell copies on Half.Com. As for Koji Suzuki's novel that originally inspired the myriad Ring/Ringu phenomena, Amazon.Com and BarnesandNoble.Com state they'll have it May 2003; Ringworld, the Mecca for all things Ringu (http://64.202.114.9/index.htm), however says that the official publication date from the publisher Vertical is April 15, 2003, and Vertical's website confirms an April 2003 release date (http://www.vertical-inc.com/ring.htm). For now, we'll have to be content with viewing the book cover online. Its an interesting play on the war flag of Nippon whose prominent feature is the stark red rays of the rising sun on a white field.
So dear reader/ DVD recliner potato, stay tuned to the Necropsy web site for reviews of Suzukis book and hopefully (pleeeeze pleeze pleeeze Dreamworks!) reviews of enhanced DVD productions of Ring/Ringu. If nothing else, word has it that a sequel to the US movie The Ring is forthcoming, which can only bode well for DVD fans since that could also herald the Region 1 release of the Ringu sequels which include Ring 2, Ring 0: Birthday, and Rasan, and of course the sequel novels from Suzuki on which the movies are based (Everybody chant it with me: We want a box set, we want a box set, we want a box set---RIGHT NOW!).
And remember, if you watch the DVD and then get someone else to purchase and watch it, you're safe . . . for now.
WATCH THIS SPACE VAMPIRE FANS: for a review of the complete collection of the anime series Hellsing.