My internet died when I was watching this film, and if that isn't technology telling me to not put myself through it I don't know what is. But I persisted. I probably should have taken my internet's advice. A large part of me knew that this film wasn't going to be good before I watched it, but I was hoping that it would be at least so bad it's funny or have a couple decent scares. I also am a fan of the concept. I haven't seen the American version of The Ring (2002), which is obviously the version this film follows, but I have seen and really enjoy the Japanese version, Ringu (1998). It is a super creepy film with a great sense of dread, and the concept of a killer video tape is a cool one. So, despite low expectations, I was hoping Rings (2017) would pick up a bit of this atmosphere. It really, really doesn't. This fell below my extremely low expectations and is probably the worst film I have seen so far this year. The film follows the idea of the haunted VHS tape, which is found early in the film by Professor Gabriel (Johnny Galecki) and his student girlfriend, Skye (Aimee Teegarden). Gabriel takes the video and turns it into his new project at the University. He enrols students who watch the video and then pass the curse on, with the goal of finding whether there is an after life. Holt (Alex Roe) is one of the students who gets involved with the experiment, and ignores his long distance girlfriend, Julia (Matilda Lutz), so as to not drag her into the situation. But, when Julia comes to find out why Holt is ignoring her, she does get caught up in it in a more severe way than anyone else before her as she receives her own video to try and decipher. It is then up to her, Holt and Gabriel to discover what is happening and finally put Samara (Bonnie Morgan) to rest.
Are you a bit lost reading that plot synopsis? I wouldn't be surprised, but I don't think I could have written a more coherent one. The script for this film is shocking. Truly terrible. The concept of the film is cool,as I have said, and I like the past material in this franchise. But this film takes the concept, wipes it arse with it and then spits in the audiences face for good measure. It is a narrative that is ridiculously convoluted, and so simplified at the same time. It has so many narrative threads that don't go anywhere and characters who appear to be important but are either just exposition spiels or forgotten about. It is needlessly complicated as well. I know that when a franchise gets this far it is difficult to come up with a new way of explaining why this narrative keeps continuing, but one way they could have done this is by taking one of the narrative threads they came up with and stick with that instead of having three or four going on which never have satisfying conclusions. Despite being overly complicated the narrative also holds the audiences hand and insults your intelligence. There are a few times where you are given information either visually or verbally but then our main character has to spell out that information to the audience as well. I'm not 5 okay, I understand what is happening you don't need a character to come out and say exactly what is going on, trust me I get it. The acting is also awful. Some of the worst I've seen. Johnny Galecki is okay I guess, and Vincent D'Onofrio is average, but our two protagonists are unbelievably poor. I can't be to harsh on Matilda Lutz and Alex Roe because the script doesn't exactly give them a lot to work with, but they are two of the most bland actors I can remember seeing. I didn't believe any kind of emotion they were going through, and that was when they bothered to show emotion. There were a couple line readings from Lutz which were pretty comical and so she at least has that, but Roe doesn't have even the so bad its good element to his performance. I know the script was bad and that doesn't help, but oh boy, these two were crap.
The biggest sin a horror film can commit is not a bad script or bad acting, plenty of horror films have both of these. The biggest sin is not being scary, even if it is only slightly scary. This film commits this fatal sin. I don't remember a horror film I have seen where I was so completely relaxed the entire way through. This may be because a lot of bad horror films these days go for endless jump scares, and I am a jump merchant so these get me. This film attempts to go for more creepy vibes with just a couple jump scares thrown in, but it just fails miserably. Everything was so predictable, and the film was lit so dark that even when scares were meant to be happening they were often hard to see. The production design was meant to add to the creepiness but just added to the dull feeling that is across this whole film. And that is the second deadly sin that this film commits, in that it is tediously dull. Even if you fail to make your film work within the genre it fits in, at least make it entertaining on some level, but no. It couldn't even do that. There were moments where I thought it was going towards the way of becoming funny and I was excited for this to happen. I got this feeling after two big laugh out loud moments in the space of ten minutes, one involving the hilarious effects on the faces of the people killed by Samara, despite their attempts to be scary, and one scene involving a bird which I won't go into more because I don't want to spoil the best moment of the film. Actually, it is probably the second best moment of the film. The last shot is the best moment. Not only because it is the last part of the torture, but also because it is one of the worst, most cliched, most predictable, most poorly shot final shots of a horror film I have ever seen, and it was perfect.
In these conclusions I tend to say whether I recommend a film or not, but I think my title more than does that job for me. Rings fails on pretty much every level. The narrative is convoluted, but the script is overly simplified to a patronising level. The scares are non-existent and the film fails miserably to create the creepy atmosphere it is so desperate to create. The acting is laughable at times, but is mostly just terribly dull and lifeless, with a couple of just okay performances thrown in there. The visual style and production design continue the dullness and bland nature of the film. It is pure and utter shit, and even a couple of laugh out loud moments are not going to change my opinion on that. I will recommend this film the same way I would recommend an actually haunted VHS tape. Don't watch it.