Superb!

Rating: 10/10 (5 July 2015)

This stunning American adaptation of Japanese novel "Ringu" bucks the horror movie trends of jump-scares and torture porn in favor of creepy, muted atmospherics and hypnotic psychological chills. Director Gore Verbinski and screenwriter Ehren Kruger move the setting to Seattle and the San Juan Islands, which Verbinski films in gorgeous, washed-out grays and greens occasionally punctuated by sunlight and blood, both of which are used sparingly. The effect is to make the film seem almost black & white, like the videocassette recording that kills you a week after you watch it. Naomi Watts leads a superb cast as the journalist investigating the unexplained death of her niece and perfectly combines both the grit and determination of an intrepid reporter and the growing fear and desperation of a mother trying to protect her child from a malevolent force she can't completely grasp. Happily, the movie doesn't try to wrap everything up in a neat package -- it gives you enough information for its central themes and mysteries to resonate hauntingly, but doesn't try to explain away every last detail.