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Running time: 97 minutes
Directed by: Banjong Pisanthanakun and Parkpoom Wongpoom
Starring: Ananda Everingham
IMDB rating: 7.3
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0440803/
Less than 24 hours before watching this, I sat and watched 'The Midnight Meat Train'. I'll briefly sum it up as a film that thinks horror is a woman having her head smashed in, followed by a CSI-style slow-motion close up of her eyeball flying into the camera. Utter ****e. In contrast, as I sat there watching 'Shutter', I thought to myself "Now, THIS is a horror film"
Not because it's full of gore and pretty teenage girls in skimpy tops being mutilated in graphic fashion, but because it genuinely unnerves the viewer in a way that very few films are capable of nowadays.
As a big fan of horror films, I've been saddened to see the move away from character, plot and fresh ideas, and towards torture ****, sequels, remakes and other forms of unoriginality. In the past, when there was a limit on what could be shown, directors had to create horror with setting, pacing and tension. Now that they can show whatever they like, it's all too easy for them to fall back upon blood instead of story, style instead of substance.
Following a car accident where their car hits a woman, professional photographer Tun and his girlfriend decide to drive off rather than help the victim. From that point on, he finds odd markings and ghostly images in some of the photos that he takes.
The final 45 minutes or so contains more scary moments than anything I can remember seeing for several years, with the ending being especially impressive.
The negative? Well, the influences of J-horror in general and Ringu in particular can be seen in some scenes. Aside from that, there are a couple of early incidents that seem scary, but then turn out to be dreams. I dislike this because a good horror scene creates tension, and culminates in something scary happening. A dream-sequence creates tension, and ends with you feel a bit let-down, which creates scepticism the next time something scary starts to happen, because it might just be a dream. Thankfully this only happens in the first third of the film, and doesn't really detract from the overall viewing experience.
If you're a horror fan who doesn't mind subtitles, Shutter is definitely worth a watch.
8.5
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