As promised, here is my take on the movie “The Grudge,” with some info on the Japanese version to help flesh out the movie.
The American version is pretty much a scene by scene remake of the Japanese version, but done with much better special affects. There are changes, which I’ll address shortly. However what is probably the most important thing to note about this movie is that it is actually the second movie of a trilogy. So if you felt a little lost then that is probably why! The original movie was a made for TV movie in Japan which told the story of the family living in the house and how the father murdered them all and left a curse upon the house. The second film, “The Grudge” details the effects of the curse.
Because American audiences are not familiar with the original movie, our version fleshed out the back story a bit more, or at least tried to. Unfortunately the addition of the whole crush on an American professor seemed to complicate the whole story. In the Japanese version, from what I recall, the husband became obsessed with the idea that his wife was having an affair. He killed her, their son and the cat. In the American version the husband becomes enraged after finding out that his wife has become obsessed with her professor, and he killed them all. In my opinion the addition of the whole professor just made it more confusing.
As the cop later explains to Sarah Michelle Gellar, in Japan they believe if one dies in the grip of a powerful rage, as this family did, an evil energy is left behind. Basically this evil is found in the house and is like a virus. Anyone who comes in contact with the house is basically marked for death, and anyone who comes in contact with the ghosts (via someone who has been in the house) is also marked for death. This is not at all well explained in the American version, which is where much of the confusion comes in. This virus theme also is one recurrent in many Japanese horror films (Ringu and Uzumaki (Spiral) for example). I think this is one of those cultural things that doesn’t translate over all that well to America. In “The Ring” it worked because the virus spread through a tape that got passed around. With “The Grudge” it is a little more difficult to understand that the virus passes between the house and people.
In the Japanese version it is important to note that the original family and their deaths happened years before. It wasn’t recent. Because of this the virus like effect the house has is better explained. In the Japanese version the movie is set up as chapters, each chapter features a different characters story and how they come in contact with the house. By the end of the film it all ties together. Not so much for the American version. There are also many more characters in the Japenese version, many more. In fact there are so many characters and chapters it becomes confusing! By the end of the film they tie all the characters together and you get it, but until that point your trying to figure out who everyone is.
Anyways, I’m now off to watch the Japanese version of Ring 2 and hope it is better than the American version.
Dustin