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ONE
MISSED CALL (2003)
A.K.A.
- You've Got A Call
Reviewed
by Rob Daniel
A
lullaby ringtone signals you have one missed call.
It's the sound of your own death.
Two days later you're dead.
As you die the message is passed on to one of your
friends.
As
'Ring'
xeroxes go, 'One Missed Call' does not seem to offer anything
new to the rapidly overstuffed Asian sub-genre of vengeful
vixens. Even
suppressing memories of 'Ring', the chain-letter like curse
and intricately prophesised demises still invoke 'Ju-on'.
But,
whereas its influences suggested
a world of violence just offscreen, 'One Missed Call'
is a Takashi
Miike film, its horrors depicted with an unflinching gaze.
And this full-blooded cruelty is what sets the film
apart from its empty cash-in cousins.
Yasushi
Akimoto and Minako Daira's script follows the familiar
trajectory of an innocent young woman, Yumi (Shibasaki), who
must investigate the reasons for the spooky slayings before
she falls victim to the curse, and is joined by a non-romantic
male companion (Tsutsumi) with a personal interest in solving
the mystery.
Fleshing
out this well-worn story is a live-TV exorcism for one of
Yumi's friends (Fukiishi) and a child abuse subplot that
sidesteps bad-taste to be truly disquieting.
With
'One Missed Call' Miike has been accused of making a
commercially sure thing, but he cannot resist muddying the
waters, especially as the film races toward the logic-twisting
conclusion. Those
who bemoan Miike's refusal to tell a straightforward story
will feel cheated, but it's a relief Japan's chief enfant
terrible applies his usual wilful vision to the
wraith-revenge subgenre.
Plus,
Miike, ably assisted by usual DP Hideo Yamamoto adds some new
images to the Asian Hall of Horror, most memorably the
vengeful spectre, hanging from the ceiling, advancing
upside-down on an unaware Yumi.
Elsewhere, horror fans can enjoy rotting zombies
(sorely underused in current Asian cinema) and one victim
tearing her own head off.
In
the lead, Shibasaki has the prerequisite wide-eyed innocence
and inner-resourcefulness and is virtually unrecognisable as
the psychopathic Mitsuko from 'Battle
Royale', and Tsutsumi brings the intensity the male lead
must have since Hiroyuki Sanada coined the role with 'Ring'.
Ably filling out a background subplot is Miike-regular
Ishibashi as a comically hardboiled detective.
Not
a classic, but for those not yet bored by vengeful serial
killing and familial mysteries, there is much to recommend
here.
Rating:
 
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