For the new English language version of Shutter , a Japanese rather than American director has been put at the helm -- Masayuki Ochiai, who directed a trio of horror tales in his homeland ( Infection, Hypnosis, Parasite Eve ). Both the original and the remake of Shutter begin with a wedding. In the new film Ben (Joshua Jackson) and Jane (Rachel Taylor without her Aussie accent) have just gotten married and are heading off to Japan for a honeymoon/job. Ben is a high end photography who's returning to Tokyo for a big fashion shoot, and Jane's game to tag along and try to make as much of a vacation out of it as she can.
Shutter (20th Century Fox)
Soon after they arrive in Japan, they take a lonely dark road to a cabin retreat. As Jane struggles to find her way, a woman suddenly appears in the road. Jane hits her and then swerves into a ditch and passes out. When she and Ben regain consciousness they can find no evidence of the woman Jane said she hit. The incident unnerves Jane. But that's just the beginning. All of Ben's photos and even photos from their wedding in New York reveal odd streaks of light. One of Ben's Japanese assistants tells Jane that these are spirit photos. Jane then visits a magazine that specializes in such images and is told that spirits have some sort of energy that can be captured on film but not necessarily seen by the human eye. The magazine's publisher suggests that these spirits must want to communicate because & ldquo;why all that effort if you don't have something to say. & rdquo; This prompts Jane to investigate further to try and figure out why this woman's spirit seems to be haunting her and her husband. Of course this spirit does have a message it wants to deliver and revenge is involved.
The choice of a Japanese director and a number of key Japanese crew (including producer Taka Ichise, cinematographer Katsumi Yanagishima, production designer Norifumi Ataka) seems to have helped make this American remake a notch better than the other recent atrocious remakes such as One Missed Call, Pulse and The Eye . Ochiai and his crew at least have a good eye for capturing striking images of Japan, whether it's the chilly, ghostly road where the spirit first appears, or the glittering, cluttered Tokyo landscape. Visually this film looks good and it doesn't just work within a conventional horror palette. There's nice use of bold bright colors (something you don't often see in horror films unless it's the bold bright red of blood) and some slick locations (like a high end apartment and photo shoot location).
Ochiai and screenwriter Luke Dawson deliver some low-key chiller moments but neither is terribly innovative or inspired. They serve up the ghost story formula with assembly line skill. The best elements are those lifted directly from the first film, most notably the satisfying end. The changes that have been made to the original story don't improve the film. The most damaging change occurs in the way that the opening accident occurs. In the new film, Jane and Ben are allowed to walk away from the crash with the audience viewing them as totally blameless. After all they call the police and no sign of a body can be found anywhere so they have done nothing wrong. But in the original film, the husband convinces his wife to leave the scene of the hit and run while the body of the woman is lying in the road. This makes the two leads culpable and less sympathetic but it makes all that follows work more effectively. In this scenario, Jane (the character had the same name in the Thai version) has mush more reason to feel guilt and to feel that this woman's spirit is haunting her and her husband for killing her. Plus it casts a darker shadow over the husband's character.
The Thai film also made the circumstances surrounding the ghost's past much darker, with the characters involved in her life behaving far more badly than in the American remake. These changes weaken the film and miss to a great degree the idea that what's scary is the potential for darkness within each person. The scariest thing are not ghosts or boogeymen but rather what seemingly normal people are capable of doing to each other. As with all the other remakes, the American film kicks up the budget and the effects work but not with any great improvement. The low-budgetness of some of the original films actually made them more effective because they had to be clever and couldn't rely on money and CGI to bail them out of a weak script.
Rachel Taylor in Shutter (20th Century Fox)
The acting in Shutter is generally weak. Jackson is a bland choice for Ben. He never seems fully likable even when the film wants him to be, plus his character doesn't change much even though our perception of him should. Taylor is attractive and appealing but does little more than look teary-eyed and scared. Megumi Okina, who played the woman beset by a vengeful spirit in Ju-On , this time gets to play the angry ghost. She displays the most range and skill of the trio of lead performers, but that's not saying much.
Shutter (rated PG-13 for terror, disturbing images, sexual content and language) is one of the many Asian remakes being ushered in by producer Roy Lee (who was smart enough to foresee the financial benefits of remaking these low budget Asian movies back in 2002). This film, like The Grudge and Ring 2 , is at least importing more than just the remake rights by employing Asian talent for the American versions of the film. Shutter is better than most of the U.S. remakes have been made but it's not as good as The Ring or Dark Water , which so far remain the more effective of the Asian horror films translated to English. But none of these remakes surpass the originals.
P.S. I forgot to mention that at the particular screening I went to there was a problem with the digital projection and the film stuttered and skipped a few times. At any other screening this would be a source of annoyance but at a film about the way spirits try to communicate with the living through manipulation of images and photos, the projection issue actually in an odd way appropriate. Maybe some spirit is trying to tell Hollywood to stop remaking Asian horror film and come up with some ideas of their own. &
Companion viewing: Shutter (2004), Ju-On, Dark Water (both Japanese and American) , Eyes of Laura Mars
