Disturbing and Genuinely Creepy.

Rating: 8/10 (28 July 2006)

"The Ring" is about a woman named Rachel Keller. She lives with her young son, Aiden in their Seattle apartment, and holds a job as a journalist. She comes upon the story of a bizarre video tape with strange and frightening images. Supposedly, if you watch the tape, the phone rings, and you die seven days later. She is a little skeptical at first, until she begins investigating the death of a teenage girl who died seven days after watching the video. She heads to a cabin in the mountains where the teenage girl was staying with her friends, and comes upon the video itself. After watching it, sure enough, the phone rings. Now a believer in the tape's mysterious power, Rachel begins to uncover the mystery behind it before she becomes the next victim - and she only has seven days to save herself and her son.
A remake of a Japanese horror movie, "The Ring" is a well-made American retelling of the unique, creepy story. Naomi Watts delivers a great performance as the heroine, and does it quite convincingly. The video tape displayed in the movie is really creepy, loaded with all kinds of gruesome images and bizarre things. I really liked the plot of this movie, it was rather original and creepy, aside from all of the unoriginal, dime-a-dozen horror flicks that are carted out constantly. The film may seem to drag a little for those who are so used to the fast paced slasher films, but if you pay attention it's actually quite interesting.
Naomi Watts leads the cast as Rachel, and is believable and empathetic - both good things for her character. David Dorffman is her mysterious but intelligent son, and Martin Henderson is Rachel's ex-husband/friend. The cast performs well and all was believable. One thing notable about this film is it's disturbing and vivid visuals, which are really great looking and add the movie's spooky and strange atmosphere. There are plenty of bizarre and scary sequences in this film, mainly in the video tape itself and the horrifying backstory behind it all.
Overall, "The Ring" is a pretty good horror movie, not perfect but very good for sure. I found it to be pretty creepy, and very different from most horror films out there. Definitely see it, it's sure to scare you even if it's the slightest bit. 8/10.