ONE MISSED CALL

(a.k.a. CHAKUSHIN ARI; YOU'VE GOT A CALL)

One evening Yumi (Kou Shibasaki, SHAOLIN GIRL) and her friend Natsumi (Kazue Fukiishi, MEMORIES OF TOMORROW) attend a bar to eat with friends. Natsumi brings up Yumi's fear of looking into holes, and their male friend picks up on this - claiming that phobias exist when someone has suffered from a trauma in the past that they cannot forget. Sure enough, a couple of flash-edit frames suggest that something from Yumi's past is haunting her.

Before she has a chance to contemplate it, her friend Yoko (Anna Nagata, BATTLE ROYALE) arrives fresh from a pal's funeral. Yumi and Yoko attend the public toilets together, where Yoko ignores an incoming call on her mobile phone, as she does recognise the ringtone as her own.

When she looks at the missed call she is alarmed to see it was made from her own number, two days into the future. She plays the answer-message, which freaks both her and Yumi out - as it appears to be Yoko's own voice, screaming.

Returning to their table, Yoko tells her friends about the odd call but they put it down to someone playing an elaborate prank. However, two nights later, Yoko dies while on her mobile phone to Yumi - leaving the exact message that they'd originally heard.

A schoolgirl friend of Yoko's turns up her flat to tell Yumi that there is a rumour relating a spate of similar, odd deaths to a woman who died while "full of hate" - she now kills people, getting to them supernaturally through their mobile phones, spreading from phone memory list to the next.

Yumi shares this rumour with her good friend Kenji (Atsushi Ida, GO), who laughs it off, saying he's received a premonitionary message from himself but is still standing. Moments later - at the precise moment his message predicted he would die - he meets an untimely death.

All of which is enough to seriously start putting the jitters up the pretty young Yumi. But when her best friend Natsumi receives a message from herself, the couple become seriously frantic. By this time, the unexplained deaths and the rumour of sinister phone message prefiguring them have started to gain publicity. A TV crew for an unscrupulous reality show entitled "Live Or Die" try to get in on the act by offering Natsumi the help of a professional exorcist - and wanting to film her "exorcism" live on TV, at the time of her predicted death …

Meanwhile, Yumi frets for her friend's fate while befriending Hiroshi (Shin'ichi Tsutsumi, THE SHADOW SPIRIT), a lone detective investigating the mysterious death of his sister. He believes she was also a victim of the phone-related curse, and has been quietly piecing clues together.

As Natsumi's hour of reckoning draws closer, Yumi and Hiroshi delve deeper into solving the mystery - uncovering a sub-plot concerning child abuse in the meantime.

Despite heightened media awareness of the seemingly supernatural goings-on, the police are unwilling to concern themselves with what they believe to be nothing more than a series of coincidentally linked suicides. Which is of no comfort to Yumi when she becomes the next person to receive a missed call from herself …

I try not to despair these days when propositioned with the chance to watch another Asian horror film. They've all become so samey, so formulaic, that it's hard to muster the enthusiasm to sit through another 90 minutes of what is certain to be another pale RINGU imitation.

But ONE MISSED CALL was a pleasant surprise. Director Takashi Miike (AUDITION; ICHI THE KILLER) lets the simplistic yet interesting story, based on Yasushi Akimoto's novel, unwind in a fluent, assured manner - the pace is leisurely yet never slow.

The cast are strong, clearly enjoying their opportunity to work with characters better fleshed-out than your typical horror type. Fukiishi plays on emotions of fear a little better than Shibasaki, so perhaps she would have been better in the lead role, but as it stands the casting is very strong indeed.

Miike continues to deliver the goods despite his exceptionally prolific work-rate, keeping a keen eye on the human-interest angle of Minako Daira's savvy script while expertly cranking up the tension gradually in a manner that rarely slips into cliché. ONE MISSED CALL also finds Miike in unusually reserved mode too, so anyone expecting it to build towards the delirium of his masterpiece AUDITION will be disappointed. Instead, it's a measured thriller with genuinely creepy moments. That it reaches a slightly muted and baffling climax should not put potential viewers off - this is a very strong entry into the Japanese horror canon, possibly the best they've offered this decade.

Contender's disc offers the film uncut in a 1.77:1 anamorphic transfer. Although a tad overly dark and with very occasional ghosting, images are generally sharp with strong colour presentation.

The Japanese audio is afforded a strong, well-balanced 5.1 mix, and there's also the option to view the film with a 5.1 English-dubbed soundtrack. I opted for the former, which was great. Optional English subtitles are also available.

Animated menus include a scene-selection menu allowing access to the film via 12 chapters.

In terms of extras, by far the best is an excellent 52-minute documentary charting the making of the film. This offers good insight into how Miike works with his crew and cast, as well providing some decent interviews with both the esteemed directors and members of his cast. Some fascinating behind-the-scenes footage rounds this one out.

Elsewhere we get what on the surface sounds uninspiring: a "Promotional Gallery". This actually consists of the film's original trailer, 3 teaser trailers, the UK DVD trailer, 3 TV spots, the full opening credits sequence for the fictional "Live Or Die" programme and trailers for AIR GUITAR NATION, A VERY BRITISH GANGSTER, THE GRUDGE, THE GRUDGE 2 and WEIRDSVILLE.

ONE MISSED CALL is pleasingly free from a lot of what makes Asian horror so boring and predictable these days. Yes, it is guilty of some of the usual traits - it's a tad overlong, leisurely paced and derives its horror from a modern everyday appliance (PULSE, PHONE, etc). But it's got more to offer, and finally sees Miike back on form. This is good disc to see it on too.

See it before the unwanted US remake ruins it's reputation forever!

Review by Stuart Willis