The following are movie reviews of "The Grudge," and "Surviving Christmas."
The Grudge
A young American studying in Japan becomes trapped in a cycle of terror set in motion by a vengeful curse from beyond the grave in the supernatural thriller, "The Grudge" (Columbia).
Remaking his hugely popular 2003 Japanese horror movie, "Ju On: The Grudge," director Takashi Shimizu wisely resists the temptation to indulge in the kind of special-effects orgy that the new version's bigger budget could have allowed, avoiding gory excess in favor of more muted psychological chills. The result is a stylish and spooky film which --- while not having much of a story --- offers viewers some spine-tingling moments.
Having hung up her wooden stakes after a seven-year TV stint on "Buffy: The Vampire Slayer," Sarah Michelle Gellar plays Karen, a student training to be a social worker in Tokyo, where she lives with her boyfriend (Jason Behr).
Covering for a fellow student who failed to show up for a home-care nursing assignment, Karen enters the house of a Western family to find a bedridden, elderly American woman (Grace Zabriskie), wearing the catatonic expression of someone who had just seen a ghost.
Investigating scratching noises coming from an upstairs closet --- its doors sealed with duct tape --- Karen discovers a young Japanese boy (Yuya Ozeki) with a postmortem complexion.
But the creepy kid isn't the house's only surprise. She also encounters the lurking poltergeist presence of a waterlogged wraith (Takako Fuji), who literally sucks the life out of the invalid woman and nearly does the same to Karen, leaving her paralyzed with fear.
The police are called in, but the chief investigator (Ryo Ishibashi) seems to know more than he lets on about the strange occurrences and how they may be related to a series of missing people --- including the old lady's son and his wife --- as well as to the mysterious suicide of another American (played by an underused Bill Pullman).
As the nonlinear story unfolds, we learn that the house is haunted by the ghosts of its former residents who perished under violent circumstances. Their grisly murders triggered the grudge, infecting the house with their eternally restless rage and fatally possessing anyone who enters it.
Much of the film's unsettling effect is owed to Shimizu's understanding of less-is-more filmmaking --- a cinematic adage anathema to Tinseltown's more-is-more mentality. With the exception of a rather generic horror climax --- capped by a sequel-promising denouement --- the movie earns its shrieks the old-fashioned way, by massaging viewers' paranoia and keeping their ice-cold sweat on a slow drip.
The film's eerie visuals and effective use of sound contribute greatly to the overall taut-nerve suspense and feeling of white-knuckle dread, with several of the picture's scariest scenes taking place in such innocuous settings as a pleasant-looking house and an office stairwell.
"The Grudge" clearly echoes other Asian fright fests like Hideo Nakata's "Ringu" (1998) --- clumsily remade as "The Ring" in 2003 --- and the Pang brothers' "The Eye" (2003).
The paranormal popcorn film has its problems, including a bland performance by Gellar and a perfunctory plot, but nothing to hold a grudge over.
Due to scary scenes, a suicide and some violence, the USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III --- adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 --- parents are strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.
Surviving Christmas
A rich businessman, tired of spending Christmas alone, pays a family to "adopt" him for the holiday season in the uneven comedy "Surviving Christmas" (DreamWorks).
Directed by Mike Mitchell, the film has a cute premise and a serviceable cast, but its screwball humor is a mixed bag of "naughty" and "nice," making this yuletide yukfest hardly the kind of family-friendly entertainment it could have been.
Ben Affleck stars as Drew Latham, a successful Chicago ad man who gets dumped by his girlfriend just in time for the holidays. Depressed, he returns to his childhood home in an attempt to relive the idyllic holidays of his youth.
Of course Drew's family no longer lives in the house, and the new residents --- including killjoy Tom Valco (James Gandolfini), his wife, Christine (Catherine O'Hara), and their porn-preoccupied teenage son, Brian (Josh Zuckerman) --- are understandably less than thrilled when a stranger shows up on their doorstep requesting permission to stroll down memory lane.
Determined to have an old-fashioned family Christmas at any cost, Drew offers Tom $250,000 to let him spend the holiday with them and pretend to be their son. Tom agrees --- without first consulting Christine --- a decision which places further tension on their already strained marriage.
But what Tom thought was a windfall quickly becomes a headache, as the hypercheerful Drew insists that his new "parents" provide him with the picture-perfect Christmas, which means participating in such Norman Rockwellesque activities as singing carols, trimming the tree and baking gingerbread cookies. He even forces Tom to wear a Santa hat in public, reminding him that failure to comply would be considered a breach of contract.
Narrative and romantic complications arise with the arrival of the Valcos' daughter, Alicia (Christina Applegate), whose initial icy attitude toward Drew slowly thaws into attraction before melting into love.
Affleck is appealing as the merry man-child, and is quite funny throughout, doing his best with the sitcomy material. O'Hara and Applegate are equally good. Gandolfini sulks his way through most of the film, looking, sounding and --- in one scene involving a snow shovel --- acting pretty much the same way he does on "The Sopranos." Still, his gruffness provides the perfect foil for Affleck's manic mirth.
Sadly, in a story about rediscovering the true spirit of Christmas, the only religious references are a scene in which Drew requests that the Valcos say grace before a meal and a sight gag involving a life-size Nativity (though in fairness, the latter is not malicious in intent).
While not without moments of black comedy --- including an opening montage that contains a shot of an elderly woman sticking her head in an oven --- "Surviving Christmas" is nowhere near as toxically cynical as last year's "Bad Santa."
In fact, at its heart "Surviving Christmas" is ultimately about the importance of family and forgiveness, and imparts a message that one can't put a price tag on love.
That being said, Mitchell deserves coal in his stocking for spoiling what could have been a nice, albeit forgettable, holiday film by occasionally and unnecessarily pandering to lowest-common-denominator tastes, including a plot twist involving risque photos of Christine which wind up on one of the porn Web sites frequented by her son.
Due to these fleeting erotic images on his computer screen, brief comic violence, a drug reference and some crude language and humor, the USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III --- adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 --- parents are strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13. David DiCerto is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. |