Ringu (1998)

Official trailer

Ringu is Hideo Nakata’s 1998 Japanese supernatural horror film adapted from Koji Suzuki’s 1991 novel, depicting a Tokyo television reporter investigating a cursed videotape that kills its viewers seven days after watching. Nanako Matsushima plays Reiko Asakawa. Hiroyuki Sanada plays Ryuji Takayama. Rikiya Otaka plays Yoichi Asakawa. Yoichi Numata plays Takashi Yamamura. Miki Nakatani plays Mai Takano. Hitomi Sato plays Masami Kurahashi. Yuko Takeuchi plays Tomoko Oishi. Hiroshi Takahashi wrote the screenplay. Toho distributed the film theatrically in Japan in January 1998 to major commercial success that set the J-horror commercial template for the later decade.

Ringu disturbs me like very few horror films do.

For long stretches almost nothing happens: a reporter watches a tape, a phone rings, the days tick down. By the last act I’m wound so tight that a woman stepping out of a television is the most frightening thing I can imagine. That slow squeeze is why it gets a 9 from me.

Nakata’s Ringu is the foundational document of the J-horror (Japanese horror) tradition that went on to dominate international horror cinema. Nakata’s commitment to atmospheric tension over explicit horror, combined with a cursed-videotape premise that works as both supernatural threat and commentary on media consumption, produced a viewing experience that filmmakers around the world have imitated ever since.

The Sadako character has become an instantly recognized horror figure, with her long-black-hair-over-face visual signature operating as permanent J-horror cultural reference.

The Atmospheric-Horror Approach

Nakata’s direction works almost entirely through atmospheric tension and gradual revelation instead of through explicit shock. The cursed videotape itself, depicted in sustained close-up across approximately one minute of the running time, contains seemingly random imagery that the surrounding film gradually reveals as connected to the underlying curse. The audience’s interpretive engagement across the running time produces specific viewer involvement that explicit horror can’t generate.

The film’s restraint distinguishes it from contemporary 1998 Western horror productions that depended on explicit violence and graphic effects. Nakata’s distinct commitment to building dread through cinematography, sound design, and gradual narrative revelation instead of through visible threat has considerably shaped later horror filmmaking across multiple international cinemas. The cumulative effect produces sustained real dread that explicit horror can’t replicate.

I love a horror film that’s willing to be patient with me, and this one is patient to the point of cruelty. The tape itself is a minute of imagery that makes no sense, and I think it’s scarier for that, because my brain keeps trying to solve it.

Sadako’s Visual Signature

Sadako Yamamura emerging from the television screen in the closing act is the horror entrance I’d rank above every other in modern cinema. The long black hair covering her face, the white burial garment, the unnaturally jerky movement and the sheer impossibility of her climbing out of a flat screen into the viewer’s room add up to a sequence later films have copied without ever matching. That scene alone is worth a full point of the rating for me.

The visual signature has become permanent J-horror cultural reference. Later Japanese horror productions including Ju-On, Dark Water, and others have developed variations on the long-haired-female-ghost character type that Sadako established. The cumulative cultural influence has extended to international productions including the 2002 American remake The Ring and later horror productions across multiple cinemas.

The Media-Curse Conceit

Takahashi’s screenplay structures the horror around media transmission instead of around traditional supernatural haunting. The curse passes through videotape viewing and through telephone communication, with the seven-day timeline operating as both supernatural threat and as commentary on contemporary information-age culture. The conceit gives the film thematic depth beyond pure horror plotting.

The media-curse structure allows the film’s copy-the-tape resolution: viewers survive by copying the tape and showing it to somebody else, passing the curse along instead of ending it.

The final revelation that Reiko can save her son only by passing the curse to her own father is resolution and ethical complication at once. The ugliness of that ending is exactly right. A mother does the loving thing and the monstrous thing in the same act, and the film won’t tell me which one to feel.

Is Ringu as good as people say?

I give Ringu a 9. Nakata’s patient direction, Sadako’s walk out of the television and a curse you can only survive by handing it to somebody else add up to a horror film that still frightens me more than the big-budget remake it spawned.

The only thing I’d change is a middle stretch where the investigation gets a little procedural. It’s required viewing for anybody who cares about horror.

Frequently Asked Questions