The feeling of fear that invades. The uncomfortable certainty that technology has bad intentions. The permanent feeling that there is out there something that wants to harm you. He Japanese horror or “J-Horror”” had its peak of glory in the late 1990s and early 2000s, taking advantage of the turn of the millennium and the omens. However, the mood they provoke is still valid today, ending in 2024. It is the perfect time, then, for streaming in Shudder from the documentary The J-Horror Virus directed by Sarah Appleton and Jasper Sharp.
The documentary has a traditional structure, but there are well-selected images and interesting interviews, with some film academics included as well, but mostly you will find people (directors, screenwriters, actors) who had active participation in the films that shaped and defined the J-movement. horror. That includes early low-budget inspirations like Psychic Vision:Jaganrei (1998) o Ju-On: The Grudge (2002). It was a fairly closed community of collaborators who influenced each other both aesthetically and in terms of themes and characters, and the emergence of the genre coincided with new digital film techniques that played a large role in the way in which the movies were made.
In particular, to Ring give it a special place, exploring how the film’s success gave rise to a franchise in Japan and the US. Kiyoshi Kurosawa, director of Cure y Pulse talk about the images of Ring – the cursed video – which continues to be disturbing to him. He also believes that although he liked Gore Verbinski’s 2000 remake, he thought the cursed video component wasn’t as scary as the original.
The long veil of hair
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Rie Inō is one of the most interesting interviewees. She had to play the ghostly Sadako in Ring by Hideo Nakata, and her performance was so unforgettably terrifying that she agreed to return for the sequel even though she had had her baby shortly before (she also says that Sadako’s famous hair veil was her hair, without wigs or extensions).
The J-Horror Virus It’s more than a series of clips. Because it delves into the reasons why J-horror resonated so deeply with audiences, and analyzes how elements perceived as common to horror films (such as the long-haired ghost) actually come from traditional Japanese folklore that It focused on women who sought revenge from beyond.
They are ancient stories that took on new life as modern urban legends, highlighting the universal feeling of isolation and loneliness. That means anyone can watch a video of a haunted house, anyone can contact a spirit by surfing the Internet. And that anyone could be you!
Kurosawa says it like this: “It is difficult to understand what a terrifying event is, things that normal human reasoning cannot understand but that are expressed in the film, without explanation.”
This article was translated from Gizmodo US by Lucas Handley. Here you can find the original version.
