Washed-up true-crime writer Ellison Oswalt finds a box of super 8 home movies that suggest the murder he is currently researching is the work of a serial killer whose work dates back to the 1960s.
A man who specializes in debunking paranormal occurrences checks into the fabled room 1408 in the Dolphin Hotel. Soon after settling in, he confronts genuine terror.
Director:
Mikael Håfström
Stars:
John Cusack,
Samuel L. Jackson,
Mary McCormack
A mother and daughter, still wounded from a bitter custody dispute, hole up in a run-down apartment building. Adding further drama to their plight, they are targeted by the ghost of former resident.
Director:
Walter Salles
Stars:
Jennifer Connelly,
Ariel Gade,
John C. Reilly
In 1921, England is overwhelmed by the loss and grief of World War I. Hoax exposer Florence Cathcart visits a boarding school to explain sightings of a child ghost. Everything she believes unravels as the 'missing' begin to show themselves.
Two strangers, who awaken in a room with no recollection of how they got there, soon discover they're pawns in a deadly game perpetrated by a notorious serial killer.
Rachel Keller is a journalist investigating a videotape that may have killed four teenagers (including her niece). There is an urban legend about this tape: the viewer will die seven days after watching it. If the legend is correct, Rachel will have to run against time to save her son's and her own life.Written by
Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
An interesting feature on the VHS release: rewind the tape to the very beginning. (Or just put the tape in the VCR when fully rewound.) When you play it, you see the cursed video. After the segment ends, you hear a phone ringing twice, then it goes into the previews. Also after the movie has ended, you see additional scenes that help explain the mystery of the cursed video. In the VHS reissue, it just has the movie itself. See more »
Goofs
There is no such thing as a "tracking window" in videotape terminology, as the A/V lab clerk says. The term "tracking" is used to describe the adjustment of the relationship between control track pulses and the start of a video track (video tracks are written diagonally by a rotating drum, which Noah and Rachel mess with in the previous scene). It's a phase adjustment, the correct phase chosen by the VCR is basically an angle, and all VCRs, even the most basic home units, can read the tape with a control-track-start-of-video-track phase of -180 to 180 degrees (in other words, the full range). Having a wider read head would actually introduce noise and make the video tracks less readable. The clerk/technician makes it sound like videotapes store film frames, and higher-end machines can read larger images. Furthermore, the overscan area of a VHS tape (or any analog composite signal for that matter) is nowhere near large enough to hold a whole other image. See more »
Quotes
[first lines]
Katie:
I hate television. Gives me headaches. You know, I heard there's so many magnetic waves traveling through the air, because of TV and telephones, that we're losing, like, ten times as many brain cells as we're supposed to. Like, all the molecules in our heads are all unstable. All the companies know about it, but they're not doing anything about it. It's, like, a big conspiracy.
See more »
Crazy Credits
The FBI warning in the home release features spooky noises in the background. See more »
I must say that I consider myself to be a lover of horror, but much too often, sex and gore is subsituted for real horror and you don't get that feeling of genuine fear in the pit of your stomach. Not so with "The Ring". Never have I seen a film that has affected me so. The images seem to tug at your subconscious, at the dark things we keep inside. I haven't been able to close my eyes without replaying bits of the film behind my eyelids. I have slept with the light on since I've seen it, and we can't stop talking about it. Hands down, it was the best, the scariest, the creepiest, and the most intense horror film ever. The audience in the theater all gripped their armrests, breathed heavily and felt everything the characters were experiencing. It was excellent! But beware.... don't expect to leave "The Ring" in the movie theater, it will certainly be with you for a long time.
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I must say that I consider myself to be a lover of horror, but much too often, sex and gore is subsituted for real horror and you don't get that feeling of genuine fear in the pit of your stomach. Not so with "The Ring". Never have I seen a film that has affected me so. The images seem to tug at your subconscious, at the dark things we keep inside. I haven't been able to close my eyes without replaying bits of the film behind my eyelids. I have slept with the light on since I've seen it, and we can't stop talking about it. Hands down, it was the best, the scariest, the creepiest, and the most intense horror film ever. The audience in the theater all gripped their armrests, breathed heavily and felt everything the characters were experiencing. It was excellent! But beware.... don't expect to leave "The Ring" in the movie theater, it will certainly be with you for a long time.