Ju-On: The Grudge (2002) | 31 Days of Horror: Oct 13

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If you’re one to hold a grudge, I would counsel against holding this one.

Tonight’s film is a creepy Japanese horror film called Ju-on: The Grudge. It’s a slow burn film that takes its time to methodically give you the heebie-jeebies.

Before Viewing

The trailer gives no context as to the plot of the film, but is certainly creepy. A woman hears someone enter her house at the door at the top of the stairs. As the camera moves over to see who it is, a creepy, pale, bloody girl crawls down the stairs head first, slowly reaching out for the woman. Creepy, creepy, creepy. Just what does this all mean?

Presented below is the trailer for the film.

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After Viewing

The film is divided into six segments. RIKA: Welfare worker Rika (Megumi Okina) is asked to do an in-home check on a woman, Sachie (Chikako Isomura). She finds the woman catatonic and laying in her own filth. After cleaning up Rika tries to engage the woman in conversation, but to no avail. There are weird noises coming from upstairs. Investigating, Rika finds a young boy, named Toshio (Yuya Ozeki), and a cat hiding in the closet. Spooked, Rika heads back downstairs to see a dark spirit attacking Sachie. Rika faints.

KATSUYA: In the same house, but prior to the events with Rika, Katsuya (Kanji Tsuda) and his wife Kazumi (Shuri Matsuda) go about their daily routines along with his mom, Sachie. While Katsuya is at work, Kazumi is haunted by a black cat and visions of Toshio, and goes into shock. When he gets home he finds his wife catatonic, and sees a ghostly version of Toshio. Kazumi dies suddenly and a dark shadow falls across Katsuya’s face. His sister Hitomi (Misaki Itô) shows up and sees him acting weird, almost as if he’s possessed.

HITOMI: During the events seen in the first section, Hitomi calls her brother to make sure he’s doing ok. At her office she has a strange encounter in the restroom and notifies a security guard. She watches the guard attacked by a shadowy figure on the CCTV. Freaked out, she heads home not noticing a figure of Toshio on every floor of her elevator ride down. At her apartment Katsuya calls her back asking to be reminded which apartment she is in. When she opens the door, after seeing him through the peephole, there’s no one there. She hides under her covers, but something else is there too and she is consumed.

TOYAMA: Rika’s co-worker Hirohashi (Chikara Ishikura) finds her at the house and calls in Detectives Nakagawa (Hirokazu Inoue) and Igarashi (Daisuke Honda). They discover Katsuya and his wife dead in the attic. Igarashi finds a news story about a man named Takeo (Takashi Matsuyama) who killed his wife Kayako (Takako Fuji) and son Toshio five years ago. The ghosts of Toshio and Kayako continue to haunt Rika. The Detectives find Detective Toyama (Yōji Tanaka), who was in charge of the previous investigation. He does not want to be brought back in and returns to the house to burn it down. He has a vision of a teenage girl leaving the house while three others stay and are killed. Nakagawa and Igarashi return to the residence and are attacked and killed by the creepy ghost of Kayako.

IZUMI: Toyama’s daughter, Izumi (Misa Uehara), who was seen as a younger girl in the previous section is now a teenager. She is trying to cope with the deaths of her three friends that were killed recently while visiting a local haunted house. She escaped because she was too scared to stay. This was the vision that Detective Toyami had in the previous section. Her two school mates try to cheer her up, but she becomes withdrawn and paranoid that something is coming for her. Her mother says this is just how her father acted before he died. Her friends find some photos of the school group, which depicts Izumi and the three dead girls with blacked out eyes. The dead girls and Kayako come for Izumi.

KAYAKO: Rika has returned to her life and is working as a nurse at a retirement home. Strange things still happen to her like feeling a hand in her hair while showering or seeing Toshio hiding under a table while eating with her schoolteacher friend, Mariko (Kayoko Shibata). Mariko calls Rika to tell her she is meeting with a student of hers that never shows up at school, named Toshio. Rika rushes over trying to prevent Mariko from being attacked but is too late. Rika’s reflection appears as Kayako for a moment, just before the ghostly woman crawls down the stairs towards her. Rika sees herself as the ghost in many of the previous moments in the film as a bloody Takeo descends the stairs and kills her. Rika is now a ghost living in the attic who suddenly awakens!

“A man named Saeki Takeo killed his wife Kayako there. Later he was found dead on the road by a neighbor.” – Detective Igarashi

Welcome to the fifth film this week celebrating an anniversary. The theme is decades of anniversaries and Ju-On: The Grudge is the entry for 2002. Like Army of Darkness (which is celebrating its 30 anniversary this year) last night, Ju-On got a wider release the following year in 2003, but its initial premiere was in 2002. It is a creepy horror film that was part of the Japanese horror resurgence, known as J-horror, of the early 2000s. This resurgence was marked, at least in terms of Western recognition, with the 1998 film Ringu. In fact these two films share a number of similarities in terms of horror, tone, and plot. The film is the third film in the Ju-on franchise, but the first film released theatrically (Ju-On: The Curse and Ju-On: The Curse 2 were both released in 2000 direct-to-video). The opening title cards explain that Ju-on is a “curse of one who dies in the grip of powerful rage,” which is related to the places that person lived. When other people encounter the curse, they die, and a new curse is born. This cyclical nature of the curse is similar to the curse of the videotape from Ringu, in which to survive having watched the tape, the viewer must get someone else to watch the tape–creating a cycle of ill will and discourtesy. The character of Kayako also shares similarities with her counterpart in The Ring series, Sadako. Both are young, female spirits with long stringy black hair that move in halting and creepy ways as they come to kill their victims. From an American perspective, it’s similar to the way that Michael Meyers and Jason share elements between themselves.

The subtitle of the film, The Grudge is apropos, being defined as “a persistent feeling of ill will or resentment resulting from a past insult or injury.” These ghosty spirits involved in the original murder persist their resentment on the living that intrude on their space. Thematically this “curse” could also be viewed as a metaphor for cancer or an easily transmitted virus. Exposure breeds the infection which soon claims the victims life. That’s part of the horror of the film since by the time the character realizes they are in trouble (ie. infected) it’s too late.

Ju-on unveils itself in a non-linear way which is an interesting tactic for a horror film. Other than a flashback, which might reveal the killer’s motives, most horror films play out from point A to point B. The jumping around, chronologically, is another element of the horror keeping the audience off balance. By not revealing the the initial murder of Toshio and Kayako, their appearances are shocking and abrupt. But as the story evolves, the viewer comes to understand the tragic nature of their stories, possibly empathizing with them.

While the psychological horror elements are interesting, that’s not the most spine-tingling elements of the film. Director Takashi Shimizu utilizes sound effects to great success in preparing the viewer for a scary moment. The croaking and staccato noises associated with the ghosts definitely set your teeth on edge. The moments aren’t especially graphic or jarring either, unlike many horror films. There are no jump scares or graphic gore. Instead the creepiness comes from the strange elements that are shown and the anticipation of what’s to come. The first time the ghostly white Toshio shows up, Hitomi’s reaction to the shadowy figure consuming the security guard, or the brief glimpses of Toshio on every floor that Hitomi passes in the elevator are all good examples of moments that come slowly and relentlessly. The security guard moment is especially reminiscent of a similar scene in Exorcist III.

This film launched a series of movies in Japan that featured six sequels including The Grudge 2, The Final Curse, and Sadako vs Kayako (a crossover with the Ring franchise). It also spawned a series of American remakes starting with 2004s The Grudge (with Buffy alum Sarah Michelle Gellar), plus two more sequels and a second remake from 2020. The film might be a little overburdened with too many characters, which might make it difficult for American audiences to get into the story. However, even if the viewer isn’t paying super close attention, the atmosphere that the film brings exudes chills. Goosebumps will probably happen whether you want them to or not.

Assorted Musings

• The one unexplained thing in the film is not about any supernatural elements at all. It is how much time has passed between the Toyama and Izumi sequences. Since his daughter was presented as maybe 8 years old, and then in high school when she died.
• With the non-linear storyline, there are certain things that happen to indicate the passage of time or the linking of stories. Hitomi’s phone call to her brother is heard in sequence one. In Izumi’s story, the news reports the death of Rika, indicating Izumi is the final chronological death..