I just watched Sadako vs Kayako so I now must present to you my top 8.
Before anything, I won’t be including movies such as: Ichi the killer, Audition, Battle Royale, Sympathy for lady Vengeance and so on, because those are violent and bloody surely, but they lack the supernatural component,so they belong in another list! Along with most of Takashi Miike’s films.
I am leaving many movies out, yes, cos these ones are the ones I can recall most of what happened without having to watch again and made a bigger impression, but of course there are tons of good movies, like Whispering corridors, The stair of wishes or something like that, Tomie, etc.
1.- A tale of two sisters: Let’s begin with Korea, they bring to us this awesome and surely confusing tale, of well, two sisters, things are surely not what they look like. After spending some time in a mental institution the sisters come home.
2.- Ringu (The ring): Japan’s turn.What can I say? One of the first movies of this sort I’ve watched, the premise is simple, watch a tape, get cursed in X days, proceed to die. Ah vengeful spirits.
3.- Art of the devil (Long Khong): Thailand, why are you like this? Black magic, voodoo, hella lot of revenge, seriously one of the most gruesome films I’ve watched, and damn I’ve watched such things…Yikes! The one I remember the most is the part 2, my favourite, but any of the 3 will make it hard to sleep in peace.
Sorry about the cropping, it’s a bit hard to find the cover.
4.- One missed call: Japan surely is something else. I think this is one of my all time favourites, I must had watched it about 15 times, through the years. You get a call, from your own phone, well, you get a voice message, then you die in X days (why won’t you kill people more quickly!) it’s interesting cos it tells a lot about how people make their relations and are using technology and blah blah. Plus the ringtone is cool AF.
5.- Sick Nurses: Oh another Thai beauty. I love this one because it feels like a parody, I think it’s one..I’m not sure. It’s really over the top, it presents the most commonly seen tropes in Asian horror movies, long hair, revengeful female spirit, deadly water, etc. Towards the end it turns really original and I just had to love it for it.
6.- Train to Busan: This is not what I would call terror, but it has zombies, plus it made me cry when I watched it alone in the cinema theater. Not cos it was so scary, but cos , as usually, Asian horror movies have a very sad part/backstory/ending. I loved every single minute of it. Another jewel from Korea.
7.- Shutter: From Thailand, ghosts and cameras, a perfect match. It’s really creepy, I got to watch it in a cinema theater and loved it , (in Mexico we don’t always get this sort of movies shown on the big screen, sadly)
8.- The eye: This amazing title comes from Hong Kong/ Singapore , a blind woman who gets a cornea transplant and gets to see the world sounds lovely right? Yeah, except when you can see ghosts and terrible things. (hey it reminds me of Misaki Mei from “Another” anime)
Jigoku der Himmel 