Rings Matilda Lutz, Alex Roe, Johnny Galecki. Directed by F. Javier Gutiérrez. Rated PG-13. Now playing citywide.
Despite its commercial success, the Ring franchise has always suffered from some built-in drawbacks. One is the whole "seven days" structure, which reassures the viewer that whoever's being threatened by soggy ghost girl Samara won't be killed until the countdown ends—if it's only "Day 4," the worst that can happen is a non-fatal jump scare. Another problem, which has become more prominent over the years, is that Ringu, the original Japanese movie that kicked things off, was made at the tail end of the VHS era. Back then, finding someone else to watch the cursed video—someone you wouldn't want to potentially die as a result—was a practical difficulty. Now, however, a victim can just upload the thing to YouTube.
Rings, the much-delayed latest chapter in the saga, does at least make a token effort to address what role the Internet might play in the mythology, though the answer it comes up with is less than satisfying. Mostly, though, it's an incredibly tedious rehash of the first movie (American remake version), following a bland young woman named Julia (Matilda Lutz) as she more or less retraces Naomi Watts' steps, trying to find out more information about the horrors that befell Samara during her short life. Joining her on this quest is Gabriel (The Big Bang Theory's Johnny Galecki, looking incredibly bored), a super-hip college professor who seeks to prove the existence of the human soul by experimenting with the video and some remarkably naïve students.
Directed by Spanish filmmaker F. Javier Gutiérrez, Rings demonstrates almost none of the slow-burn creepiness that made the original films (both Japanese and American) such deliciously tense experiences. Instead, it just traffics in the usual horror clichés, wasting fine actors like Vincent D'Onofrio and Aimee Teegarden in schlocky support. Gutiérrez engineers one effective set piece, in which the video shows up on every headrest in an airplane, but this sequence has virtually nothing to do with the rest of the movie (and has been released online, in any case, so you can watch it right now for free). And you can still rest easy most of the time, knowing that Julia's potential death is still days away, no matter what frightening figure may suddenly appear behind her back, accompanied by a loud sting on the soundtrack. They've never really figured out how to solve that problem, and while Rings takes care to end in a way that opens the door for yet another sequel, it's unlikely that they ever will.
