Movie Review: The Grudge

Hi everyone,

I hope you all have been safe and warm this past week! Unfortunately for me, I had a power outage in my area, so I've been without Internet and electricity for about 5 days! My heart goes out to all of you who had to go through that too! I never realized how dependent we were on electricity until it was gone.

Anyways, this post was meant to be submitted during the week of Halloween, but we all know how that went (no electricity, no posting for me). I was going to review a scary movie for the occasion, but even though Halloween's over, I still am, as you can watch scary movies any time.

Alright, it's been a while since I've watched The Grudge (I watched it in 7th grade), so my summary's going to be a bit fuzzy since I don't want to watch it again (it scared my pants off the first time).

*SPOILER ALERT BELOW~*

Summary:
It starts with this quote that says something about how a curse is started every time someone is killed in extreme anger or something like that. Then there is this old lady that lives in this house, and her caretaker, who is this Japanese girl (I think), hears some noise coming from the attic. She then walks into this closet (I think the phone is ringing above it), and when she looks up, a pair of arms reach down and pull the girl, who is now screaming, into the ceiling (to the attic probably). It then fades out to another scene of the police investigating the house. (This paragraph may be horribly inaccurate, so sorry about that.)

The police are looking for the Japanese girl, who has been missing for a few days, and the company that employed her filed a missing persons report on her. I am not exactly sure what the setting is, but it is probably Japan. This police officer chief guy goes into the closet and looks up, seeing a big pitch black hole in the ceiling. When they investigate it, I believe they find dead bodies of people, including the Japanese girl. I don't remember what happens after this, but I do know a new woman has been assigned to be the old lady's caretaker.

This new woman (who is pretty much the main character) goes inside the house to take care of the old lady, who seems to be somewhat mute and senile, and during the night, this scary shadow thing that appears out of nowhere attacks them both, killing the old lady. The police come over again later on, and the woman sets out to find out what happened and why.

The movie also shows how the old lady moved into that house in the first place. Apparently, she comes with her relatives (I think it was her daughter, and her son and his wife) to visit the house first. They decide that the old lady will move into the house. Sometime later, the daughter gets off work, and in the building she works in, she starts to see that there is this ominous force after her. She rushes home, and in her apartment elevator, there is this creepy boy's face every time it passes a floor window. Running into her home, she quickly locks the doors. She then hears her brother's voice outside the door, telling her to let him in. She is relieved to hear his voice, but when she opens the door, there is no one there. She locks the door again and jumps into her bed, hiding under the blankets. However, the ominous force (this creepy lady) grabs her legs from the beneath the blankets, and pulls her down. They disappear into the blanket.

Eventually, the woman (the main character) finds out that this wife and her son was killed in anger by the husband, who later committed suicide. They all died in the house that was mentioned earlier. She discovers that anyone who enters this house is cursed to die very soon after entering it, which explains all the sudden deaths. As she has also entered the house, she must find a way to stop the curse and save herself.

What I liked about it:
This movie lived up to its label of being scary. Then again, The Grudge was the first scary movie I had ever watched in my life, and I watched it when I was 12, so maybe it's not as scary as it seemed back then.  This was pretty much all I liked about the movie.

What I didn't like about it:
Although there's not much I liked about it, there's practically nothing I disliked about it either. The only part I disliked was that it was scary enough to make me afraid of my bathroom, of being alone, and of the dark for like a long time, but most scary movies will do that anyways, so I guess my one dislike doesn't really count.

Overall:
This movie is scary and is probably not meant for the faint of heart, but for those of you looking for a scary movie, you should probably watch this. I will never get over the creepy lady and her death rattle (the sound she makes; it's called a rattle because her neck is broken).

- Melissa He, 12th Grade, Editor/Writer for Entertainment