Reincarnation (2006)

As Good As It Gets

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

I have seen this movie few times but never in full before and now I seen the whole lot. There were some decent ghost scene but none of them were really that creepy.Until that doll/girl ghost, that scene was very creepy, if I saw that in real life , I would have pi""ed my pants (laugh Out Loud).That stuff belongs in nightmares, that is one my favourite horror scenes.I liked how the plot came to end , even though I knew when the story was leading.I going to give it a 9 out of 10

Nagisa Sugiura (Yuka) is a young Japanese actress who comes face to face with a slew of ghosts. These restless spirits begin to appear when she signs on to star in a horror film which tells the true story about a crazed, local professor whose murderous rampage at a hotel left 11 guests dead, including his young son and daughter. The director of the film is making the movie at the actual hotel where the murders happened, so it's not long before Nagisa starts to witness them more and more.Rinne (Reincarnation) isn't actually that bad of a movie. The story itself is pretty simple, but it does tend to jump about a bit so it can get a bit tricky to follow. It's also a wee bit slow in parts, but the parts where it picks up makes up for that slightly but just not enough for me.What kind of saves it bombing totally for me are some of the ghost scenes, especially ones that involve a doll. These scenes - in particular one near the end of the movie - are pretty freaky, so it's just a pity that the rest of the movie didn't have that same kind of creep factor. I know a film can't be just full of scenes like that, but you can't help wishing that it had more to make it that much more gripping.There are some elements that reminded me of Ju-on (which was a much better film), but considering the director of that movie and this are the same, doesn't surprise me.Overall, it's not too bad of a movie to watch, especially if you like pretty creepy Japanese horror films, but there are better ones out there.

***SPOILERS**** Has to be seen at least twice, like being reincarnated, to really appreciate what a great psychological thriller "Renni" or "Reincarnation" really is. The film gets somewhat confused and esoteric at times, especially in the first five or so minutes, but when it gets down to business just watch out!Making a horror/suspense film about a bloody massacre that took place back in 1970 at the now abandoned Ono Kanko Hotel outside of Tokyo top Japanese movie director Ikuo Matsumura, Kippei Shiina, cast actress Nagisa Sugiora, Yuka, in the leading role. Nagisa is to play one of the victims of the hotel slaughter the six year old daughter Norishasa, Atsuhsi Haruta, of crazed killer Professor Kazuya Omori, Shun Oguri.What would be the part of a lifetime for the young and practically unknown actress turns out to be a nightmare for her. Telling her good friend and acting teacher Tadashi, Tetta Sugimoto, that she feels strange playing Omori's murdered daughter in that she sees the young girl in both her dreams as well as while she's awake and fully conscious! There's a scene when Nagisa, while she's with Tadashi, is on the Tokyo Subway and suddenly sees young Norishasa with her battered, with it's left eye busted, doll standing right in front of her! With Nagisa turning away for a split second to alert Tadashi to what she saw both Norishasa and the doll disappears in a flash!As the movie goes into production Nagisa begins to become spooked whenever she's to act out a scene in it. Seeing in a number of visions of the insane Professor Omori doing his dirty work slaughtering the people in the hotel Nagisa also sees him recording his bloody work with a 1950's style 8mm Bell & Howell movie camera! It later turns out that Omori, through his secret writings, was obsessed with the theory of reincarnation and in his madness went out to prove it by killing everyone in the hotel, himself included, so they can come back in other lives to prove his point!By now Nagisa is fully convinced that she's actually the reincarnation of Professor Omori's murdered daughter Norishasa. It's when things suddenly start to magically materialize in her hotel room, almost out of thin air, right in front of Nagisa's eyes, like Norishasa's doll and her father's movie movie camera, that it becomes apparent that Nagisa's greatest fears have more then just a a grain of truth in them. ***MAJOR SPOILERS FROM THIS POINT ON*** Nagisa gives the mysterious movie camera to her friend Tadashi to have the film in it developed and see what exactly is recorded on it. This all takes a number of days for Tadashi in him trying to find a photo lab, being that almost everything now is "filmed" on video tape and DVD discs, that could process the film. When the movie camera film is finally processed Tadashi has it screened in front of Director Matsumura and his film crew. What they see is a horror that even the most brutal and bloody slasher movie couldn't duplicate! The film also shows that not only is reincarnation real but who the brutal and psychotic killer Proffesor Kazuya Omori really is! Not back then in 1970 but now in his new incarnation!

No doubt about it : for a scary movie, it's really scary. Some scenes are really frightful, especially when some characters come to see impossible presences, that make their rational universe slowly collapses into madness, and that transforms their fake fear into a more than real one.There's lot of things in that movie, maybe to much. "Rinne" tells the story of the filming of an horror movie, but also of of the murders that occurred in a Shinning-like hostel thirty years ago, or of an actress who's too involved in her part. There's maybe way too much to tell to find coherency in all that, and what the movie wins in abstract fear, it loses in unity.But if Takashi Shimisu fails to tell us a linear story, he archives to make us fell the deep fear of his characters : some scenes are incredibly frightened and beautifully directed (especially the ones with the ghost-father and his creepy camera-eyes). He really uses noises and visual codes to creates a (Jap')horror atmosphere. It's really too bad that the movie ultimately looks like a catalog of style effects : of course, it works, but is it enough to make a movie ?