Rings: "You're Here About The Girl, The Girl In The Well"

Director: F. Javier Gutierrez
Writer:    David Loucka
                Jacob Aaron Estes
                Akiva Goldsman
Starring: Matilda Lutz
                Alex Roe
                Johnny Galecki
                Vincent D'Onofrio
                Aimee Teegarden
                Bonnie Morgan
Rating:    **

Release Date: Out Now 

1998, Japanese cinemas are terrified by the movie Ring. 2002 comes around and the beginning of Hollywood remaking Japanese horrors begins,  starting with The Ring, starring Naomi Watts. It is a hit, and audiences worldwide are scared, also introducing the masses to the far superior Japanese horror films. In 2005, Hollywood releases The Ring Two, and it is an underwhelming film that fails to match the original success. Now, twelve years later and Rings has been released. The third in this apparent trilogy, and the only way to describe it is unnecessary cinema.

Matilda Lutz, Johnny Galecki
& Alex Roe

The story is the same as it always has been. Watch a video tape, receive phone call telling you you have "seven days", seven days later girl crawls out of TV and kills viewer of video. The only new development is that if you copy the video and make someone else watch it, you can save yourself. It is certainly a sequel that didn't need to be made, and despite the trailers looking promising, the finished product is far from that.

This sequel is also missing all of the original films characters, which causes Rings to feel more like a remake than a sequel. The new characters are one dimensional and obvious in their

Aimee Teegarden

casting, acting choices and characterisations. Johnny Galecki as the professor who has discovered this chain effect to survive has moments that are hopeful, but he is used minimally and doesn't get many opportunities to push his character through.

Director, F. Javier Gutierrez, has directed a horror movie. Does it have scary moments, yes a few; does tension build, on the odd occasion; has he made a film that will stand proudly next to horror films from the past, no. The problem for me is that Rings does nothing new. I have seen The Ring and The Ring Two, and in this third film I learnt nothing new, felt no difference, and honestly didn't understand why it was made. Studios try different things to make their money, but this is a studio trying the same thing to make money.

After watching the trailers, I was genuinely excited  to see Rings, and hopeful that it would scare me silly. Consequently, the film was uninteresting and lacking in true terror. When a good horror film is made, the world talks about it, the audiences pile in, and movie makers know that history is being made. Rings has been released to little fanfare, and sadly little success. 

Rings - Trailer