[Movie Review] POV ~Norowareta (呪われたフィルム) Film~

This J-Horror movie by horror movie director, Norio Tsuruta 鶴田法男 (つるた のりお), is released under the tile, POV A Cursed Film (被诅咒的影片) in Singapore and is opening in cinemas from 26 April.

Thanks to the folks at Shaw, I caught the preview screening on Monday (16 Apr) with a group of bloggers at the exclusive Shaw Preview Theatre (not open to public).

I was wondering whether the screening venue was a deliberate prank. Look at how similar it is to the movie theatre featured in the POV movie (images via Venice Jacob’s blog):

Spooky isn’t it?

The whole movie is shot with an unique video camera-style cinematography; features many short POV horror video clips; and had the lead actresses starring as themselves in a tricky plot of a reality ghost movie about the making of a reality ghost movie.

Trailer:

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I find this a refreshing change from the typical slow-moving J-Horror movies which we are used to.

Bubblegum pop songs were used as song tracks and the two leads are dressed in super kawaii Japanese schoolgirl uniforms. These are definitely unconventional for a horror movie.

Go catch this in cinemas if you are a fan of horror movies to EXPERIENCE a “Blair Witch” style movie in Japanese (but with a proper story line and less nauseating shaky video shots)!

I am puting emphasis on the word “experience” as watching POV has a simulacrum effect where one would find it hard to discern between what was the “reality” in the movie and what was the “copied reality”. Sounds pretty confusing? You will know what I mean when you see the movie for yourself. 🙂

Synopsis:

年轻女艺人志田未来和川口春奈为节目录制了一段“映像投稿”的单元，为观众介绍有“灵异画面”的映像。在播放其中一段映像时，画面突然出现异像，并播出原本不属于节目原稿的画面。春奈认出画面中的场所，就是自己就读的学校。而出现的画面，仿佛跟学校流传着的灵异事件有关。为了安抚两位女艺人，制作组安排了灵媒来进行超度。但灵媒却坚持必须回到学校，才能够彻底解决问题。殊不知，一行人回到学校，却遇见更多不可思议的怪事……

Mirai and Haruna are shooting a show streamed on smartphones which introduces different viewer submitted videos. That day the videos were all of paranormal phenomena, carefully selected alleged accurate accounts of haunted occurrences. In the middle of one video, the image gets interrupted, immediately turning back on to show a footage that was not in the script. The video capture an urban legend rumoured at Haruna’s school. A psychic on the show assesses that a certain demonological ritual must be performed in order to rid the school of this phenomena. The director, agents and the two girls go to the school accordingly to find there is more to the video than meets the eye…