Thursday, November 2, 2017

Pulse (Kairo) (2001)

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa. Cast: Haruhiko Katô, Kumiko Asô, Koyuki. 118 min. Rated R. Japan. Horror.

Another modern Japanese horror, astonishingly ahead of its time. Similar to The Ring, it uses audiovisual technology (here, the advent of the internet) to delve into the horrors of loneliness in our supposed 'era of connectivity' - even forecasting the duplicity of social media at bringing people together. Add to that, the mastery of sound effects during moments of silence and ambiguous lighting of the backgrounds, create some truly terrifying sequences. But then, the second half loses steam quite fast, due to lack of a coherent script to connect these incredibly imaginative moments of terror. A hugely missed opportunity.

PS: Inspired a Wes Craven-written 2006 remake which apparently flopped.

Mo says:


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