5 Best & 5 Worst Asian Horror Movie Remakes Ever Made

1. The Ring

The film that kick-started a wave of American J-Horror remakes just so happens to be the best too. Gore Verbinski’s take on Hideo Nakata’s Ringu, itself an adaptation of Koji Suzuki’s novel, retains much of Nakata’s slow-burning tone and emphasis on chills as opposed to thrills while staying true to much of the original film’s plot. In doing so, the remake succeeds where so many others have failed.

Transferring the action to other side of the Pacific, cinematographer Bojan Bazelli makes effective use of the American Northwest’s rain-soaked scenery infusing the movie with an eerie and bleak sense of foreboding that complements Verbinski’s bent for the surreal. Hot on the heels of her acclaimed role in David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive, Naomi Watts brings her acting chops to the role of a journalist and single mother determined to solve the mystery of the cursed videotape before it claims her son whose increasing desperation matches the film’s feeling of mounting dread.

If there’s an element that falls flat in Verbinski’s take, it’s that evil spirit antagonist Samara’s face is shown throughout the film. Arguably it’s Nakata’s incarnation, named Sadako in the original, whose face is almost always obscured by hair that packs more of a sinister punch. It’s symptomatic of a general trend in American remakes of Asian horrors for overtness over subtlety, but thankfully in The Ring it’s largely limited to this one difference.