Verbinski's Horror Succeeds

Rating: 8/10 (11 January 2012)

Journalist Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts) investigates the existence of a strange videotape that, according to an urban legend, causes the death of anyone who should watch it, thus making it the ultimate video nasty. After locating a copy of the vindictive VHS, Rachel not only decides to watch it, but also lets her ex-husband Noah (Martin Henderson) have a gander, and leaves a copy laying around for her son Aidan (David Dorfman) to see!!! Needless to say, the legend proves to be true, the tape allowing the vengeful spirit of freaky murdered girl Samara to literally scare viewers to death.
As someone who can actually be bothered to read sub-titles, I generally dislike it when Asian horror hits are remade to appeal to a Western audience, particularly since very few of them turn out to be as effective as the originals. Gore Verbinski's The Ring, however, is a genuinely worthy effort, because instead of simply being a quick Hollywood 'cash-in', it is actually a lovingly crafted movie.
Storywise, Verbinski's film stays fairly faithful to Hideo Nakata's Ringu and effectively replicates its creepy atmosphere, but The Ring avoids being just a slavish copy by expanding on certain plot points, providing a few crowd pleasing jump scares along the way, and best of all, by being as visually impressive as possible, with coloured tints and CGI effects used to great effect throughout (I usually moan about such things in modern horror films, but here they actually work).
I wouldn't go as far as to say that The Ring is better than the original, but I think it is equally deserving of a watch.