Rings - 2/5

Let's say all 4 Japanese Ringu films and both American Ring films make a complete circle, a "ring" if you will. If that ring represents a fertilized egg then this little film Rings is out by itself, a bastard little sperm that didn't win the race to fertilize the egg and is left to die and rot. Rings, as you can tell, is completely forgotten about today and it seems like it was made to be a quick gimmick and to quickly die. This short film was filmed in conjunction with The Ring Two to bridge the events of The Ring to the opening of Ring Two. It was released on DVD right before the second hit theaters and to me it just seemed like a quick money grabbing idea by the filmmakers.

The story of this short 16 minute film is basically a video journal of a teenager named Jake, who is shown the cursed tape of Somara. It seems that the cursed tape has become a real phenomenon among teenagers who like viewing the tape to experience all the strange visuals. These teenagers form groups which guarantee your survival by setting up someone to see the tape before your seven days are up. Jake's friends are real jackasses though and leave him high and dry to die as they want to see what happens on the seventh day. Desperate to live Jake starts calling around school trying to find someone else to pass the curse onto.

The film does have a lot of interesting visuals and camera shots but plot does break some rules established in The Ring. The idea of having the cursed tape becoming a popular phenomenon among teenagers is interesting and would be better off exploring in a full length film but overall this "tie-in" to connect the stories of The Ring and The Ring Two is rather pointless. I do have to laugh at the people who bought this DVD when it was first released as it was re-released on the unrated edition of the The Ring Two DVD. Oh, you have to love money grabbing Hollywood sometimes!

Written By Eric Reifschneider