The Grudge III

12/12/2016 16:54

Film: The Grudge III

Year: 2009

Director: Toby Wilkins

Writer: Brad Keene

Starring: Matthew Knight, Shawnee Smith and Mike Straub

 

Review:

This film begins not too long after the last one ended. Matthew Knight has survived the ordeal, but now is in a psychiatric hospital. His doctor is played by Shawnee Smith. She is trying to convince him that he is safe in the hospital and that nothing is going to get him. She also tells him that he will have someone watching over him. She leaves his room. An orderly is watching, but he is helpless to stop when he watches Knight be thrown around his room. Knight was scared of Aiko Horiuchi, who plays the ghost of the curse, and she has killed him.

During the credits we get a montage of everything that happened that is important to note in the first and second films. We then shift to Tokyo, Japan. A woman goes to her office at work; she is played by Emi Ikehata. She is upset about an article that is taped to her computer monitor. She goes home to Takatsuna Mukai. He tells her to ignore it and she informs him that she can’t. She needs to go to Chicago to help end this curse.

The film then shifts back to the apartment building from the last film. We see a young woman, played by Johanna Braddy, with her boyfriend, played by Beau Mirchoff. We learn that she has an internship in New York City to be a fashion designer. Mirchoff is coming with her as a fitness model. They go into a room to make love, but stop when they realize they are in the apartment that belonged to Knight and his family. They flee.

We then shift to a little girl, played by Jadie Rose Hobson, as she is playing with dolls. Watching her is Marina Sirtis. They talk about things and Hobson believes her sister is going to make it famous and take her to around the world when she does. A man then enters the apartment. He is played by Gil McKinney. McKinney is actually Hobson and Braddy’s older brother who is the also the landlord of the building they live in. McKinney is trying to take care of his sisters since their parents died. With Braddy leaving for New York soon, he is more stressed, especially since Hobson has something wrong with her breathing.

They run into another issue at this building. Ever since the death of the family, some of the residents are leaving and the reporters are not making it easier for them to find new tenants.

There is a new family of a mother and her daughter who do move in. They do not last long as the daughter goes to take a bath. She gets pulled into the water and the scene is edited to mimic what happened to Horiuchi’s character in the first film. When her mother comes into to check on her, she is nowhere to be found. Hobson also sees a little boy, played by Shimba Tsuchiya, who is the ghost of Horiuchi’s son.

Ikehata comes to the apartment building and can feel that the curse is there. She meets with McKinney and takes an application to live there. Ikehata meets his family as well. When she leaves the building, Horiuchi can be seen in the door.

Braddy hears something while she is in her apartment, which is the Knight family apartment. She goes up to see what is going on and meets with Smith. Smith lets on that Knight has died and tells her some of what he had said. Mirchoff shows up and embarrasses himself. After Smith leaves, Mirchoff wants to fool around in an empty apartment. Back in their apartment, Hobson has one of her attacks after she sees Tsuchiya. McKinney needs to use an oxygen tank to help calm her. McKinney also uses this to lecture Braddy about not leaving.

Sirtis and others in the building meet the curse. McKinney begins to change into the role of the father in the curse and becomes angry. Braddy learns more by meeting with Smith until she is claimed by the ghost. She also meets with Ikehata who fills her in on the history of Horiuchi and the curse. It turns out to be her sister. Can Ikehata stop this curse? Will Braddy, Hobson and McKinney survive or will they be claimed by it? Can this curse truly be stopped?

The best thing that I liked about this film is that it continued on with the main story. I am fine with adding different layers that were not a part of it, as long as it doesn’t discredit something that has already been introduced. For the most part, this film does that. I liked McKinney, Braddy and Ikehata. They didn’t do anything that blew me away, but they were solid. McKinney did well at mimicking the actor from the original film. The film also does some good things with the ghost and its scares. I did find this one to be the least scary of all the three though. I also found the ending to be pretty good, it is your typical horror cliché, but still I enjoyed it.

Now there were some issues I had with this film. I clearly could tell early on that this one is not done by the same director. Horiuchi and Tsuchiya also were new in their roles to this film. Tscuhiya looks similar to the other boy, but he looks older and taller. I really didn’t care for Mirchoff and I thought Smith was not very good in her role. This one also is bloody, which is something that is not used in the previous films. I really didn’t like that aspect, because that is not something the ghost does. Usually the bodies disappear or they are just found dead, this one leaves a bloody body count.

With that said I would avoid this one unless you are a big fan of the series and want to see its conclusion. The acting is not as good in this one. There are some bright spots, but nothing like the previous two films had. The story is okay, but still not as good as the previous two. I feel the story has run its course in the second one and this one really wasn’t needed to be honest. There are definitely better ghost/curse films out there that are more worthy of your time.

 

My Rating: 5 out of 10