The Ring 2

Naomi Watts
Simon Baker
Elizabeth Perkins
Directed by: Hideo Nakata

Plot: Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts) and her son Aidan (David Dorfman) leave Seattle and move to a small town to escape their actions from the end of the original film. When someone in the small town dies from watching a copy of the tape she made, Rachel tries to destroy the film and in doing so releases Samara. Samara takes over the body of Aidan and Rachel Keller has to find out how to stop her.

Review: This movie makes no sense. I say that up front because that is my first response to watching this movie. After the opening sequence, the film completely abandons the idea of watching the tape and waiting 7 days to die, the premise of the original film. Which would be fine, if I could figure out the point of the new premise.

The original movie was a mystery where the why and the how led you through the movie to it’s surprising conclusion. This movie takes an entirely different approach wherein absolutely nothing is explained and you just follow along until the end, oblivious to why anything is even happening. I don’t think you are supposed to know why anything in particular happens and why it may or may not be important. There is a scene with a herd of deer, no explanation, just deer that start attacking their car. And for some reason, while Samara is in Aiden’s body (did I mention that she takes over Aiden’s body), they can only communicate with each other when they are both sleeping. The movie takes about 10 minutes of the entire running to try to convince the audience that there is some kind of reason to all of this. And even that seems like an afterthought. Supporting characters make random, out of place statements that are meant to lead you in the direction of the next completely unexplained event. And then it is over as quickly as it started. Sitting here after the fact I can’t help to not only wonder the how and the why of the film, but more importantly why they felt they needed to make this movie at all.
 

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