Genre: Horror/Thriller/Mystery
Director: Eric Valette
Cast: Edward Burns, Shannyn Sossamon, Azura Skye, Ana Claudia, Ray Wise, Margaret Cho
RunTime: 1 hr 27 mins
Released By: Warner Bros
Rating: PG (Horror)
Official Website: http://www.onemissedcallmovie.com

Opening Day: 10 January 2008

Synopsis:

In this remake of the Japanese horror film "Chakushin Ari" (2003), several people start receiving voice-mails from their future selves -- messages which include the date, time, and some of the details of their deaths.

Movie Review:

There are folks who are vehemently against Hollywood remaking Asian films but with the huge market in the USA that are still unwilling to watch foreign movies with subtitles and Hollywood seemly running out of ideas, there is simply no way to stop the constant churning of Asian remade movies. And of course, it’s a no brainer that horror films bring in hordes of people into the cinema so with one and one together, we are getting One Missed Call from Hollywood.

The original Japanese One Missed Call “Chakushin Ari” had gathered enough fans (or enough profit) to see that it had the longevity through two sequels before coming to a stop. Personally, the repulsion to catch this popular franchise was that after the success of Ringu (The Ring), plenty other copycat horror movies started popping out and by experience, they are seldom worth watching. After Ringu took certain unconventional manner in telling a horror story, many of these Japanese horror copycats felt that they are given the liberty to stretch weirdness as far as possible and hope that somehow they might hit a chord with the audience. Needless to say, most don’t and end up a trying experience.

So with a rather forceful manufactured plot device in One Missed Call, expectation for this film to impress was low and thankfully, it had a rather short runtime to “suffer” in.

But after reviewing it, the whole experience wasn’t that bad after all.

The plot was predictable till the extend that it shouldn’t be difficult to predict when the ring tone will ring or how the scare is coming up (and that’s without watching the original movie). Even the first few “accidental” deaths felt very “Final Destination” like but without the high tension scares or gore. In fact, with the exception of a few scares, One Missed Call was pretty much a tame affair.

What made it not that bad?

It didn’t try to be too smart for it’s own good or attempted to created those weird events that required higher intellect to comprehend. Simply put it, it was a point A to point B horror movie and that’s what enjoyable about it. Audience gets to see teenagers dying in inventive manners, some adequate computer generated special effect for the haunting and attractive looking actress and actor to eye candy at.

Although the ending felt like a blatant cut and paste from Ringu*, the pacing of the film to the “climatic” ending was a fast one and the revelation was at least sensible. All the positive factors listed above made this One Missed Call a rather guilty enjoyment for the tired mind.

Movie Rating:

(miss-able but it won’t be that bad if you pick this one missed call)

Review by Richard Lim Jr

* (Spoilers content Scroll Over to read)

How similar was the ending? There the fake ending scenario where it’s not really over yet and after which, there the Lead Actor’s “unexpected” death instead of the Lead Actress who was supposedly cursed and marked for death. Lastly, there the haunting came from a juvenile source! Sadako anyone? It’s recycle but hey, it could be fun picking up the similarities!

(Spoilers End)