In Japanese dialogue with Chinese & English subtitles
Genre: Horror/Thriller
Director: Ryuta Miyake, Mari Asato
Cast: Akina Minami, Hiroki Suzuki, Ai Kago, Kouji Seto
RunTime: 1 hr 48 mins
Released By: InnoForm Media & GV
Rating: PG (Some Disturbing Scenes)
Official Website:

Opening Day: 1 April 2010

Synopsis:

Ju On: White Ghost

An entire family is slaughtered. A former friend is murdered, throat slit... In the midst of her despair, a young girl sees...

In a certain house, the son who failed the bar examination kills five members of his family one by one. He then dies by hanging himself. At the moment of his death, he made a cassette tape recording in which he can be heard saying “I’ll go. I’ll go soon...”

On the same tape can be heard the eerie sound of a young girl’s voice. It is the voice of Mirai, who was a friend of Akane (Akina Minami) while in primary school. Akane is now a senior high school student. Mirai was the victim of the incident in which an entire family was murdered. Akane has had strong extra-sensory perception since childhood, and one day Mirai appears in front of her, wearing the yellow cap and red backpack of a primary school student...

Ju On: Black Ghost

The grudge of someone that could not be born... Filled with an unimaginable ‘hatred’, people are killed one after the other with a curse.

Nurse Yuko (Ai Kago) is left in charge of a young girl named Fukie, and begins to
experience strange things. Medical examination reveals that there is a ‘cyst’ in
Fukie’s body. The hatred of the unborn one is feeding off of the young girl, and
curses the people around her. Yuko’s neighbor is taken by the girl in black, and
Fukie’s father commits a murder and goes insane. Fukie’s mother, Kiwako, has to
rely on her younger sister, Mariko, who possesses psychic powers. They thought
that her exorcism had been successful, however it was just the beginning of the
worst possible ‘grudge’...

Movie Review:

Next to “The Ring”, the “Ju On” series is probably the most iconic horror franchise to have emerged from Japan. Besides the obligatory girl with long hair, “Ju On” is also notable for the pale-as-a-sheet boy Toshii and its hair-raising throaty clicking that preceded the appearance of said ghosts. The two latest additions to the franchise retain these trademarks, and of course, the very premise of “the grudge”- which, for those who are unfamiliar, describes a curse that is born when someone dies in the grip of powerful rage or extreme sorrow.

Just so you know, “White Ghost” and “Black Ghost” are two separate hour-long features which are now screened back-to-back in the theatrical release. In “White Ghost”, the “Ju On” is born of a family massacre in which a son brutally murders all five members of his family after hearing voices; in “Black Ghost”, the “Ju On” is the spirit of an unborn twin living as a cyst in a young girl called Fukie. It’s inevitable one compares the former to the latter, especially since the two sport no connection to each other.

In terms of pure shock value, it’s quite apparent that “White” is scarier than “Black”. In “White Ghost”, director Miyake Ryuta displays a knack for conjuring cheap but effective “boo” scares that you may see coming but will nonetheless make you jump in your seat. That’s not to say however that “White Ghost” is the more enjoyable of the two as one will quite soon discover when watching it.

Like the previous “Ju-Ons” , “White Ghost” uses a fractured narrative to tell its story in a series of shorts each focused on a specific character somehow linked to the curse. Compared to the other “Ju-Ons” however, and even its counterpart here, Ryuta’s “White Ghost” is particularly mind-boggling, following neither chronology or character connection in arranging its shorts.

This demands quite a bit of patience on the part of its audience, since it takes time to figure out how all these little pieces come together. In fact, it does get more than a little confusing and frustrating even particularly at the halfway mark. Luckily though, Ryuta manages to wrap up his disjointed tale up quite nicely, and those who had bothered with the intellectual workout to pay attention to the little details will still find your time and effort worthwhile.

On the other hand, “Black Ghost” is told in a much more straightforward manner, with clear chronology and connections between one character and the next. Besides being easier to follow, director Asato Mari’s tale actually proves to be the more engaging throughout. While its story of “unborn vengeance” isn’t new, Mari shows a better sense of pacing that effectively builds up a progressively unsettling atmosphere with his mini-Exorcist of a story right up till the gruesome end.

Still, that’s not saying a lot, because neither “White Ghost” nor “Black Ghost” come close to being anywhere near a horror classic. Perhaps the novelty of hearing that throaty click has worn out, or seeing long-haired girls in black or white isn’t so scary anymore after countless other such movies, but it’s unlikely that these two features will revive any interest in the “Ju On” franchise. Of course, there are still enough scares here if you’re looking for a horror fix, but ten years after Takashi Shimuzu terrorised the world with his low-budget original, “White Ghost”and “Black Ghost” just can’t quite repeat the same success.

Movie Rating:

(Enough scares for a quick horror fix, but this is nowhere near the original that made the “Ju On” franchise so well-known)

Review by Gabriel Chong