Format: Streaming video from Tubi TV on Fire!
Horror movies always reflect the fears of the time and of the culture. It’s not shocking that post-9/11 a lot of American horror films were like Hostel and Turistas: extremely xenophobic. A great deal of Japanese horror was of the atomic variety (Gojira and the like) for obvious reasons, but a lot of Japanese horror is ghost-based as well. Japanese horror stories have involved ghosts for centuries; often the ghosts are there to impart morality lessons to the living. Modern Japanese ghosts, though, are often about bringing up the sins of the past—the people of the present are still paying for the crimes that happened years ago. That’s certain the them of the Ju-on films, and it’s the major throughline of Ju-on: The Grudge 2 (or just Ju-on 2 if you prefer).
While this does tell a particular story, it does so in a non-linear structure that isn’t easy to follow. It jumps around a lot and we see the same thing from several different perspectives at different times. The conceit of the original movie is continued here. That original conceit is that when someone dies in extreme sorrow or extreme rage, those emotions linger, generating a curse. Anyone who encounters that curse dies from it and lingers themselves, continuing and expanding the curse in an ever-widening circle. That’s where we started in the first movie, where we ended when the first movie ended, and where we will pick up here.
What this means is that we’re going to be dealing once again with the Saeki family and specifically the ghost of Kayako Saeki (Takako Fuji) and her son Toshio (Yuya Ozeki), both murdered by her husband. The house is now cursed, and anyone who enters the house will be equally cursed.
So how are we going to get there? Well, a Japanese television crew is filming at the Saiki house. The show, which delves into the paranormal, has a clear rationale for wanting to film there, but of course the entire cast and crew is doomed the moment they step inside. What follows, then, is the story of how all of the relevant people encounter the various ghosts and end up being destroyed by them.
To keep things interesting, the narrative jumps around a lot. If this was told in a straightforward manner, the film would probably be about 30 minutes long, which means we have to go back and forth a great deal. We’ll see the story from the point of view of one person being attacked by Kayako and/or Toshio and then we’ll see that from someone else watching it happen. Everything put together in order is really just the story of Kayako and Toshio expressing their rage and killing everyone in one way or another.
The thing about all of the movies in The Grudge series is that you’re not really watching them for the riveting plot, because the plot told front to back is incredibly simple. You’re watching it for the terrifying ghosts, who seem to come out of nowhere, making hideous noises and freaking everyone out. That’s the point of the films—the freak out the audience with the ghosts. And, honestly, it works. The ghosts are scary as hell.
The reality, though, at least for me, is that I struggle with caring a great deal about what is going on. I’m not really invested in the characters a great deal, and that might simply be a failing on my part. The problem with the film is that the conclusion is a foregone one—we know that there’s no real escape from the fate that lies ahead of them. It’s really just waiting for the inevitable and wondering in exactly what form it’s going to come this time.
So, what that means is that Ju-On: The Grudge 2 is interesting in terms of the way that it looks and the scares that it offers, but nothing really beyond that. It’s good for what it is, but it’s not really good beyond the single viewing. There’s nothing here beyond the scares and the visuals.
Why to watch Ju-on: The Grudge 2: It’s a solid continuation of the original.
Why not to watch: It’s hard to follow because it jumps around a lot.