Sadako vs. Kayako

 


Name: Sadako vs. Kayako

Directed By: Kôji Shiraishi

Subgenre: Foreign, Supernatural

Series: Spooktober 2019 entry #4; review #35

Review: You've seen The Ring; you've seen The Grudge; you might have even also seen the original Japanese versions because you're a horror cinephile, but you probably haven't seen Sadako vs. Kayako. And you probably shouldn't. The film is a pretty obvious cash grab banking on the two franchises, and it is unsurprisingly lesser than the sum of its parts. It's inspired by the spirit of Freddy vs. Jason where the two titular horror icons beat the ever-loving hell out of one another, but these are modern, Japanese horror icons: their bread-and-butter is supernatural dread and not campy, slasher violence. Putting them into a film where the whole point is them duking it out just doesn't work. Let me back up a bit. The film centers around a few different groups of characters that serve to bring the viewer up to speed on each of the franchise's specters before intertwining them under the idea of letting their cursed progenitors duke it out because, like, hopefully that will break their curses? The film gets some bonus points in my book near the climax because the two become a massive eldritch abomination for some reason, but that's only on screen for a few seconds and is undone a few more seconds later. It's got a few interesting kill shots, but the rest is a hurried mess that somehow still takes an hour to even get to the point (regardless of whether the point is actually a good idea or not). This is one of those self-defeating marketing ploys that will only really appeal to past fans of either series while simultaneously alienating them with a movie that massively misses the point of the previous entries. Sadako vs. Kayako is a beer and popcorn kind of movie built on the backs of better franchises that will likely only appeal to those who never cared for the ghostly characters in the first place.




Overall Score: 2 out of 5 Chads hiding from pale ghosts behaving badly. Did Sadako vs. Kayako scare you? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!

IMDB: Here

How to Watch: Sadako vs. Kayako is available on these platforms.


Official Trailer



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