There was a period beginning in the late 90s when Asian “J-Horror” was all the rage. Director Hideo Nakata’s Ringu became an international horror sensation and made us afraid of video cassettes and televisions. Takashi Shimizu’s Ju-On: The Grudge made us fearful of real estate. Kiyoshi Kirosawa’s Kairo (Pulse) turned us against our computers. It was a fertile era for subtle Asian shockers to disturb our dreams. But how do we explain to our children what “J-horror” is? How do we even explain video cassettes to them? I found myself recently recommending a bunch of these films to a teenager who stared at me with bored indifference. May I suggest a child’s primer. A little pop-up book with, say, a drawing of the girl climbing out of the well in The Ring and one of these little ditties alongside. Here’s my pitiful rhyming attempts to explain Asian fright flicks to youngsters.
Ju-On. If you rent this house in Japan you’ll want your money back/there’s a vengeful female ghost in the attic and a blue boy who mews like a cat.
Ju-On 2. The “grudge” keeps on spreading it can make you real mental/that blue ghost kid and his mom make life hell for new rentals.
The Eye. A girl gets a cornea transplant to regain her sight/but then she sees dead people and, boy, it’s a fright.
The Ring (Ringu). This J-horror classic about a cursed video tape will make you lose your mind/when a creepy girl climbs out of your TV before you hit “rewind.”
Audition. When a widower creates phony movie auditions to meet women he’s way off base/but is he surprised when the girl he picks ties him down and drives needles into his face.
Three Extremes. Three Asian directors create spooky short films to satisfy your horror hunger/the best is about dumplings made from baby fetuses to make you look younger.
One Missed Call. Kids get cell phone messages hearing themselves die like a cow/but can you really stop this blasted curse without saying “can you hear me now?”
Ichi The Killer. A mentally challenged man in a super hero outfit dispenses gangsters with a blade in his shoe/in this gory Takashi Miike cult fave in which many body parts get sliced through.
Wild Zero. In a futuristic world, unisex travelers and rock bands fight a landscape of living dead/there’s a drinking game where you take a shot when someone combs their hair or blows off a zombie’s head.
Whispering Corridors. This Korean all girl school is really hell to be in/especially when it’s haunted by the ghost of a dead lesbian.
Infection. Usually when you check into a hospital you exit just fine/but not when an infected patient turns the nurses to green slime.
Stacy. Japanese girls in school uniforms can look quite smart/but not when these zombie chicks are chomping on your heart.
Seance. A female psychic and her husband kidnap a girl and lock her in a room/in the Japanese TV version of Seance On a Wet Afternoon.
Premonition. A newspaper foretelling future deaths falls out of the sky/is there any way to change events or do you just lay down and die?
Junk. Japanese gangsters meet to sell off stolen jewelry at an abandoned army base/unfortunately they meet gut-munching zombies keen to bite off their face.
A Tale of Two Sisters. Two sisters return home from a rest cure convinced that they’re well/but when they see ghosts under the sink their life goes to hell.
Evil Dead Trap. A snuff video ends up with a TV reporter who thinks it will help her career/but when it leads her to a deserted army base things get pretty weird.
Suicide Circle (Suicide Club). 50 Japanese schoolgirls jump to their death in front of a speeding train/and it’s all tied to a female pop band who sends subliminal signals to your brain.
Uzamaki (Spiral). A town in Japan becomes obsessed with things spiral/but when they start mutating into snails is it something quite viral?
Dark Water. A mother and her daughter rent a run-down apartment for some much-needed healing/but what the hell’s going on with that weird stain on the ceiling?
Cure. A detective searches for clues on an elusive serial killer/who talks others into committing crimes in this nutty Japanese thriller.
Phone. A female reporter and her daughter get some threatening phone calls/in this Korean ghost story that will have you climbing the walls.
Versus. Yakuza gangsters battle zombies in some very haunted woods/and the swordplay and splatter that follows is really quite good.
Pulse. “You’ve got mail” when the dead come through your computer in this chiller that won acclaim/but leave it to the American remake to be really, really, lame.
