Dean's Thoughts on Entertainment

The Grudge

I saw The Grudge, breaking a long drought of non-theatre movie watching. I had an evening of mixed pleasure. In retrospect, I was dissatisfied with the movie on many levels, however it had tons of jumps and freaky moments to be enjoyed. For an idea of the movie multiply the freak out moments in The Ring by about 4, so that every suspensful scene delivers the gratuitous scare. But remove the clever mystery story that accompanied The Ring and replace it with a bit of string and a sticker. Yes the story was that exciting, and it actually barely had a story at all. The movie was built on a premise which you received in the beginning and thats it. I watched the movie with CJ, and he loved it but he admittedly has different tastes when it comes to horror, which he tends to avoid. He liked the premise and just reveled in the peril. Personally, I like to jump in the main character's shoes and try to calculate how I would overcome, or attempt to overcome. This movie allowed none of that, and so I was never able to become engaged in the movie. And the scares where weakened by the fact that the villian was never really explained, so each scene redefined the villian so that you couldn't theorize counterattacks and the like. Ah, I could go on forever about how I like my horror. If you identified with my whining, you can skip The Grudge. I'll try to catch Saw, and then complete the Halloween experience this year.

Oh, and Sarah Michelle Gellar was OK, not as good as Buffy but better than Daphne.