The Grudge: Critic Reviews

A horror film that consists of virtually nothing but don't-go-in-the-attic suspense scenes strung together with a reasonable degree of brooding mood and a minimum of logic.

Less scary than creepy, The Grudge may have lost some oomph in the translation from Japanese to English.

The new film's hill of beans doesn't loom very tall when its acting weight rests on the shoulders of Sarah Michelle Gellar and the ever-likable but unassertive Bill Pullman.

It's just not the kind of frightening that stays with you very long, unless of course someone decides to make the same movie . . . yet again.

It's enough to send you home with jiggly knees and a tummy ache.

The trouble with Shimizu's impressionistic approach is that it doesn't entrench you deep enough inside anybody's head or put you far enough behind anyone's point of view for the scares to really work.

The soundtrack's Dolby thumps and screaming violins head off any genuine scares.

Adds nothing to the haunted-house genre aside from the horror of spilled ramen noodles on tatami mats.

The Grudge is all about fright. It's not about mystery, characterization or perverse amusement, all of which can turn horror into something more.

The Grudge shows just enough blood to be scary but not self-indulgent.

We need to care about Karen. That we never quite do isn't scary. It's merely disappointing.

I eventually lost all patience. The movie may have some subterranean level on which the story strands connect and make sense, but it eluded me.

The Grudge simply wants to make you wet your pants. Even if it doesn't, you'll still find yourself in the market for a nightlight.

It isn't frightening. Sometimes, in fact, it's laughable.

The opening minutes hit us with a shocker on a par with the shower scene in "Psycho," and the tension rarely lets up thereafter.

Anyone who has ever seen a horror flick will know where this one's going every inch of the way.

Rather than building to a climax, Shimizu introduces his poltergeists too early. Once the ghosts start rattling around, we can generally anticipate what's coming next.

Project might have been more successful if Shimizu had style and/or atmosphere to substitute for his canned scares, cardboard compositions and flaccid cutting.

Mostly, it's a tepid affair.

A spine-tingling little creepshow.

Almost every single one of the American characters has maybe a third of the personality of the ghosts that haunt them, so you begin to think the grudge itself is less a curse than a perfectly reasonable eviction strategy.

There are so many events here but no real story. Perhaps that is what's making the drowned kabuki ghost so irate: She's desperate to find a coherent script.

Generally speaking, I like a little more plot with my 'Boo!' moments.

The new version is slightly less frightening than the original, but it's still a scary psycho-horror that effectively replicates its bleak and crisp shocks.

More than anything, The Grudge suggests that it's time for Shimizu to move on.