Speaking from a Singaporean point of view - Singapore provided a good portion of the main cast, and it was one of the first locations the film was released in - I think it is interesting to note that locally The Eye was not regarded as a very good movie. When it was released, it was almost universally panned by critics and viewers alike. In fact, the movie only did so well at the box office because everyone wanted to see for themselves just how bad a horror movie with Singaporean actors, most of whom have the acting ability and onscreen presence of a large block of wood, could possibly be. (It was probably the film's financial success that spurred the directors to make two more sequels, the Eye 2 and the Eye 10, each more farcical than the last.) I myself have not seen the movie, but my friends who have tell me that it confirmed their worst suspicions, and halfway through they gave up trying to get any kicks out of it and began treating the whole thing more like a bad joke than a horror film (and found it much more enjoyable after that). So you can imagine my surprise when I found American audiences describing the Eye with words like "the scariest movie I have ever seen" and "an awesome scary unique piece". For a while I actually wondered whether it was the same film we were talking about.
I guess maybe it's because us Asians are spoilt when it comes to horror movies. Most of us grew up watching late-night Chinese vampire flicks on TV, and we get to see so many Korean and Japanese horror films in the cinema that it gets to the point when they're not even interesting or remotely frightening anymore. To most of the West, more used to gibbering zombies than freaky long-haired girls crawling out of wells, even substandard pretenders to the Asian horror-film throne like the Eye might seem completely terrifying. Of course, this is just the opinion of a guy who's never even bothered to watch the movie he's talking about. Is this truly the case? Please discuss.
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SadaAbe12
19 years ago
Nah, I have to agree with you. I, an American, didn't think "the Eye" was frightening in the least. The two protaganists were poor actors, the woman's acting being almost laughable. I started to even get bored with the plot after about halfway through the movie. Perhaps watching the "Sixth Sense" years before watching this film made it easy to predict but I experienced no surprise when the audience found out that the woman was seeing ghosts. I even caught a drift of the "Mothman Prophecies" (argh! that movie was a joke) towards the end with the catastrophe.
When it comes to horror movies only the paranormal scare me, never gore. I've watched gore movies like all the "Evil Dead" films and the Peter Jackson film "Dead Alive". Those films are more comedy than horror, to be honest. I liked American horror films like "The Exorcist", "the Ring", and even the "Blair Witch Project". I HATED "the Grudge" and "Dark Water". What a waste of film.
Although I haven't seen many American films with zombies (except for "28 Days Later" which I unexpectedly thought was an excellent film) I do think that you asians are spoiled over there. Or perhaps it isn't that you are more spoiled but that your ideas of horror are so different than ours that Americans are caught off-guard. What may be unoriginal to you is completely original for
American film...although I can't really say that much for "the Eye".
That movie just plain sucked.
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wickedwizard
19 years ago
I just love the ending in Shutter! Its so heavy. Talk about avenging ghost. But my absolute favourite when it comes to asian horror is of course Ringu, which in my oppinion is a far better and scarier film than the american remake The Ring (even though I kinda liked The Ring too, at least on first viewing). If U liked Ringu and The Ring I can recommend the korean remake Ring Virus. Ring Virus is a good example of how to completely fail to make a movie scary. Its really quite funny to see how the korean director chose to redo some of the scenes. See it if ur interested in asian horror, but dont expect to be scared :)
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Ktw12
12 years ago
I knew what was coming at the end in Shutter and it stilled scared the hell outta me. The rest wasn't all that scary though.
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gouletjo
19 years ago
Sorry to correct but 28 days later is not an american movie it's british
cheers
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