If you copy the tape, send it to another person, person dies without copying it, and nobody finds it (the guy lives in a very secluded place, or they don’t have any family or job, etc.) will the curse be ended?
And
What stops Samara from killing other nearby people? I understand that the person has to watch the video to become the target, but what if another person(who did or did not watch the tape) is nearby? What is it that stops Samara?
I just was wondering what is so signifigant about copying the tape? Do you have to merely copy it? Or have someone else watch the copy so that they are the new target? And what if you only see a part of the video?
As a side note, I just finished watching this, actually, and did not find it the least bit scary. Suspensful? Yes. Suprising? Kinda. Scary? No.
I think it’s sort of a chain link effect. By copying it, you’re sort of guranteeing* you’ll give it to someone else, the next person who will see it, hopefully realize that you have to copy it, and then give it to a friend.
*That brings your and mine’s questions into play.
In the Japanese version, the key to getting out from under the curse was to get someone else to watch a copy of the tape. At one point in the series a high school student decides that it’s safe to watch the tape since a reporter has asked her for a copy. (Thus the curse will be lifted from her, without involving anyone who wouldn’t have watched the tape anyway.) After a few days pass, she starts asking the reporter very nervously, “So, er, have you watched that tape yet?”
If someone dies without passing on the tape, then that cuts down on the number of tapes floating around. This was also a point explored in the Japanese series, in the generally pretty wretched “Rasen” (or as I call it, “Ring 2B”. The history of the sequels is pretty convoluted- there’s two movies that could be called “Ring 2,” one of which is very good, and the other of which sucks.) In theory, if you could destroy all the tapes, there would be no more curse, but it would doom all the people who watched it last.
Generally people want to watch the entire tape, for a variety of reasons. (i.e. they don’t really believe in the curse until the phone rings, or they figure that if you’re going to take a chance, you might as well see the whole thing.) In the Korean remake “Ring Virus” (also wretched) the plot heavily depends on the idea that no full copy of the tape exists, because someone accidentally wrote over the tail end of the original, where it explains how to lift the curse.
BTW, just because I’ve only mentioned two wretched sequels doesn’t mean they’re all bad. The ones to see are Ring, Ring 2 (not Rasen, i.e. Ring 2B) and, if you’re really into it, Ring 0: Birthday (which is interesting mostly in that it explains a lot of Samarra/Sadako’s background. Bear in mind that these are, as best I can tell, the “canonical” Ring story. Not to be a purist about it or anything, but these three tell a coherent story about what’s going on, while “Rasen” and “Ring Virus” operate by different rules, and are really bad.
FWIW, I saw the Japanese version first, and had no idea what was coming at the end. I was absolutely terrified. At the risk of sounding like comic-book man, I feel like this is a stereotypical example of studio heads “Americanizing” a foreign movie and thereby ruining a lot of what made it so distinctive. I enjoyed the American version, but it wasn’t as scary or interesting as the Japanese one.
This could also be attributed to you having viewed the Japanese version first. I’ve heard the exact opposite opinion from people who have saw the movies in the reverse order.
Just as a side note, as soon as we were done watching the movie, the phone rang. Half the room screamed and jumped up. As it turns out, one of the guys called the house with his cell phone at the right time.
Actually, I disagree. I think that of the two scenes with Sadako/Samarra climbing out of the TV, the Japanese one is more effective, but I agree that it might lose a lot of its punch if I saw what was coming. In “Ringu,” the actress who plays Sadako is notorious for giving the character a really, alien-seeming body language. There were hints that the actress who played Samarra was trying to do that, but she didn’t quite pull it off. (It looked more like she was just shrugging.)
I also liked the Japanese ending more. It seemed more ominous, with the mother driving off into storm clouds to visit her father, so that he could watch the tape in order to save the grandson.
Overall, I think the American version had to oversimplify a lot, because they had to assume there would be no sequels. In the Japanese version, that was less of a constraint, because anyone who liked the movie could just read the books, even if no more movies were made. As a result, Sadako was a much more interesting character, while Samarra was basically just evil for evil’s sake. (At the same time, I admit that the Japanese movies were a lot more confusing. However, part of the pleasure of the series was figuring out what was going on as more and more information was revealed.)
One cool thing that was left out of the American version is the explanation for why the tapes only appeared recently, when Sadako was thrown into the well 30 years ago. Her psychic powers centered on healing, and so she kept herself alive by healing not only her injuries, but also the damage wrought by starvation. After being trapped in the well for 30 years she finally died, and at the moment of death imprinted her rage on the tape.
Wow. You’ve just guaranteed that I will never, ever voluntarily watch the original.
I hope.
Well, fine, just be online the night I do (and a few nights after) so I have somebody to talk to when I can’t sleep.
My hair’s trying to stand on end just thinking about that. It’s a strange sensation when you shave your head.
If she managed to stay alive for 30 years from her pyschic abilities, why couldn’t she manage to get out of the well thru her powers? When she was staying alive in the well, why didn’t any of her negative energy still affect the island? Why did she make herself suffer so much and stay alive for 30 years? What event triggered her eventually dieing?
Her powers were uncontrollable, spooking the horses, causing bad crops, causing her mother to go insane, etc. When her mother pushed her into the well, it was unexpected for, or at the very most a vague thought with her foresight abilities. How could she manage to control her powers well enough not to die on impact?
Sorry for all the questions.
**
In the American version, she died when she was thrown in the well (the skeleton is clearly that of a child.) In the Japanese version, her powers don’t seem like they could help her get out of the well. (i.e. she can’t fly, but she can keep herself alive and magically kill people.)
**
Good question. My own speculation would be that Sadako was at first hoping to be rescued, and eventually just went crazy from being in the well and got fixated on revenge. After 30 years, maybe she just lost her grip (she may have been rotting while alive at that point, too.) Or, maybe she decided that dying was her best bet at revenge, because she could blast her rage into a videotape.
As for affecting the surrounding area, I don’t think her powers could blanket an entire village in the Japanese version.
These all relate to the American version. The Japanese version is a different storyline, so I don’t know anything more about the American “Ring” than you do. But in the Japanese version, it’s pretty clear that the blow to her head and being thrown in the well only knocks her out momentarily, and she wakes up in the well after she’s been sealed in.
In the American version, though, I thought Samarra was spooking the horses and driving people insane on purpose.
Well, it would help if they showed it…
We don’t know if she was intentioanally projecting insanity on people, that could’ve very well been a sign of her powers not yet being under control. Her father put her in a barn, because she was scaring her mother too much for them to live in close proximity. Her powers worked doublefold on the animals, making them go insane, make noise all night. She might possibly have been kept awake for too long due to the horses and went insane.
Which would make sense as to why she wanted “them all to pay”, cause the compliants against her from her mother and the other islanders forced her father to lock her up in the barn. With no one there except for the horses and a tv. I’d imagine the isolation itself would drive her mad.
Heh. Right after watching the American version in the theater with my wife and her friends, I sent an email message to one of their cell phones that read “seven days.” Good lord, did she scream.
Reading Aslan2’s posts have convinced me not to watch the american version - they CHANGED the plot? (I’m critisizing the film, not Aslan2 here, if in doubt:)).
The two Japanese films freaked me out, I still get paranoid when I look in the mirror sometimes, half-expecting to see a woman brushing her hair behind me…
But I have survived and it’s been more than a week since I saw them. But I’ll probably never find out what’s on my old indescript videotapes - especially not if there’s snow on it…and then a well…
But in regards to the OP:
I think the curse will be ‘sleeping’ - it won’t stop till every copy of the tape is destroyed (and we kill the girl in ring 2 who can make it appear on your tv anyway…). There’s always a chance someone will eventually find a tape and watch it.
I asume Samara is the american version of Sadako; I think she establishes a connection with people who have watched the tape - perhaps those are the ones she is aware of. In ring 2, the girl who can make any tv play the video just witnessed a friend die to Sadako.
Hope that made some sense.
Tikster
In the Japanese original, as well as the U.S. remake, there is another girl in the house when the first girl dies. In the U.S. version, someone mentions that she is in the mental hospital and can’t get too close to a TV. Well, Ring 2 (Japanese - I say that because there will be a U.S. sequel as well) continues with the story of this girl. She has, indeed, been affected by Sadako, in a very big way. I don’t want to go into details.
This also occurs in the part of the movie that Ben mentioned, when the reporter is supposed to watch the tape that is given to him by a girl. Although he doesn’t so much as get a glimpse of the tape, he ends up meeting Sadako all the same
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IMO, they are, in essence, the same movie. They changed the storyline about Samarra and her mother in the American version. Something which I felt made the movie stronger. Both movies I liked for different reasons. But all in all, they are the same flick.
In the American version, if you recall, the reporter (I can’t remember her name for the life of me) goes to visit the girl that was in the house. I think it is made pretty apparant that she now has some sort of connection to Samarra. She has gone pretty looney and knows, as its put in the movie, “SHE NEVER SLEEPS!”
This may be of interest: