i suppose if you are looking for a horror movie, this is not it, but kurosawa never plays genre straight. he's not looking to conform to hollywood cliches, and the emphasis is not on shock, but how this couple's ambition destroys and haunts them. the haunting scenes are creepy, but i don't think kurosawa's heart is ever in straight horror-- even in a serial killer movie like cure, the killer never kills anyone. for kurosawa, it's all about how we percieve ourselves, how others see us, and what happens when that changes.
two things i find funny about the comments here: that someone recommended the eye over seance-- the eye cops so many parts (pun intended) from seance-- most of the 'every day hauntings' that the woman has in the pang brothers' film were taken not from ringu, but this movie. the second: someone commented that "its boring story-line will be easily digested by the american masses." funny. the american masses-- as you put it --never go for boring. they, (like someone going by the moniker "loveyoulongtime" ) demand explosions every 7 minutes, and they require gore in horror. and this movie is hardly gorey. this is more psychological horror in the main, like rosemary's baby or repulsion. yes, like many asian horror movies it shares some things-- the wet little girl-- but that is pushed off to the last 3rd of the film, the meat, the heart of the film is in the couple's story. it is, after all, a remake of sorts of the 1964 movie "seance on a wet afternoon" which has NO DEAD BODIES, and is almost entirely about a couple kidnapping a child. kurosawa's remake is ingenious in the way it folds that story into his, but makes it an entirely different animal, while remaining true to the aim of the book. while the 60's version makes it quite clear that myra (the medium) is a fraud, in this version it is much more ambiguous. the point of view is certainly more asian and less western in it's orientation-- ghosts are everywhere in life, we just don't see them.
all in all i think there is much to enjoy in this film if you are up for its slow pacing, and aren't looking for wall to wall horror. if you like wong kar-wai's later films (in the mood for love, 2046), the films of tsai Ming-liang (the hole, goodbye dragon inn), then you know the pacing. if this is horror, then this is horror of the hi-brow sort. but for me, seance is about story telling, and a couple's moral decline.
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gonzogonzalez45
17 years ago
It Not scary but PHYCHOLOGICAL scary!
I have watched it today and this movie is scary because what would happen if you found yourself in the characters position? Would you say something to anyone or would you shut up? These movies are meant for viewers who can really get inside the character.
There is this horrible stereotype of horror movies which need to have BLOOD and a BEING of some kind (alien, animal, person) gone mad.
About the "Eye" comparison: The pang brothers used better cameras, brilliant sound FX and a lot of spooky shots. I think "The Eye" is much better than "Séance".(Although the two of them end up weird in my opinion).
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suz-mal
14 years ago
--About the "Eye" comparison: The pang brothers used better cameras, brilliant sound FX and a lot of spooky shots. I think "The Eye" is much better than "Seance" .(Although the two of them end up weird in my opinion).--
The Eye straight up sucked, and so do the Pang Brothers. They are incredibly lame, and just recycle the same old Asian horror tricks over and over.
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cvincent1
14 years ago
I guess what makes this film fall flat for me is that nothing I see in it strikes me as horrifying. Annoying, bothersome, infuriating at times, yes, but there is no fear here.
I tried to stick with it on the theory that what I was watching was a very dark comedy about two people who were simply too dumb to be allowed to live, but even that didn't cut it.
Two stars here-- it's not bad enough to rate 1.
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