Now, I must say, I have conflicting thoughts about this film. Don't get me wrong. I thought it was great, but hey, I'm a sucker for Japanese ghost stories. There's a few things I want to say about this movie, but first, I'm going to explain the tale of the Slit-Mouthed Woman. (
Wiki: Kuchisake-onna)
The Slit-Mouthed Woman (or Kuchisake-onna) is a popular ghost story in Japan. It isn't uncommon for rumors to spread like wildfire claiming that she is on the loose, taking out her bloody vengence on the general public.
The story started way back in the days of the Samurai. It was said that a great lord had a very beautiful but vain wife. Suspecting her of cheating on him, he slit her mouth from ear to ear, saying, "Who will think that you are beautiful now?"
Fast forward to the present age. Just like Americans have the urban legends about the hook-handed murderer of Lover's Lane or the madman who targets young couples stranded and out of gas on the side of the highway, the Japanese have Kuchisake-onna! The legend is told that a beautiful woman walks the streets, especially on spooky nights, wearing a common flu-mask. She will approach a stranger and simply ask, "Am I pretty?" (or "Watashi kirei?") The stranger would reply,"Yes!" It is then that she removes the mask, revealing her disfigured face. "Kore demo?" ("How about now?")
This is when things start to get tricky. There are many possibilities at this point. Allow me to map out the results.
- If you shriek at her, or say, "No! You crazy bitch!", she will slice your face to match hers.
- If you reply, "Yes," it is said that sometimes she will go away, and sometimes, she'll cut you anyway, depending on who is telling the story. (No winning, here, huh?)
- If you give her a trickier answer, like "Maybe," it tends to confuse her, giving you time to run the fuck away.
Also, a variation of the above mentioned scenarios: instead of cutting you on the street like a hardcore gansta, she'll scoop you up and take you to her hideout. I'm not totally sure what goes on there... Lots of cutting. This also goes for the last answer, because in some versions of the story, that bitch will chase you. And apparently, she's quick.
These rumors start to spread every other decade or so, ya know, bringing in the fresh meat of a new generation, that sort of thing. People claim to see her everywhere. And, during flu-season, she can hide very, very well.
Anyway, on to the movie.
Carved: The Slit-Mouthed Woman (2007)
A quickie: (And I mean it this time!)
As revealed at the beginning of the movie, and the trailer, the legend began 30 years ago when a young boy claimed to have seen the Kuchisake-onna.
Now, rumors begin circulating about the Kushisake-onna on the loose, snatching up little kids and eating them for breakfast... or whatever she does with them. One kid has already gone missing but the police didn't believe it has anything to do with a crazy ghost lady.
Some boys go into the park to wait and see if she shows up; as rumor has it: she appears in the park around 5pm. As they are waiting, a small earthquake shakes the town and it's people, knocking stuff off shelves and breaking open sealed demon-wardrobes (the wooden closety kind.).
After the earthquake subsides, the boys realize it's past 5pm and sigh in disappointment... when suddenly, she appears behind them! She grabs one viciously by the hair and the others scream and run off. But when they turn around she's gone, and so is her hostage.
Next, we learn about a new teacher who is trying to bond with a girl who is obviously not having the greatest time at school and home. Girls at school pick on her for wearing a flu-mask, calling her Kuchisake-onna! The mask is to cover up bruises left on her mouth by her mother (and arm, and shoulder). The teacher tries to comfort her, fails and the girl gets sntached up by the ghost lady, right in front of the petrified teacher.
Feeling responsible, she teams up with another teacher who is having some paranormal shit haunting his brain. Together, they set out to find Mika, the missing girl. He reveals that he believes that the Kuchisake-onna is actually the ghost of his mother, who used to beat him and his siblings severely when he was young. He claims that one day, his mother and siblings all vanished. Following the ghostly voices in his head whispering "Watashi... kurei...", they rescue a young reporter boy (he's like freaking 9, but he's been running around like a detective until this point, with his little book of notes about the ghost lady), and the female teacher saves them by stabbing the ghost (um.) to death. When they go back to check on the body, they realize that she wasn't the Kuchisake-onna at all, but a young woman (and mother), who was actually possessed by the ghost. (Now, we have a random dead lady on our hands.)
Shortly after this, the female teacher reveals that she wants to save Mika so badly because she, too, has a daughter. In her sad(?) story, she explains that her daughter lives with her ex-husband, and she is not allowed to see her, as requested by the father... and her daughter, because she used to hit her. (And now she feels really bad about it.)
They follow the voice again, but not in time to save Mika's best friend from getting snatched up in the park by none other than her mother (possessed) while they were out with flyers for Missing Mika. They put their detective skills together and decide that the ghost has been taking the children to her hideout. It was rumored that it was an abandoned house with a red roof. (Vague.) Turns out, the male teacher's childhood home had... a red roof!
We cut to the hideout where the slit-mouthed woman hurls Mika's friend bodily down into the cellar. She screams, and the lady really, really doesn't like that. So she cuts her from ear to ear. Turning to the boy she gathered earlier, he screams and she gives him a good stab.
The dead boy from the cellar was chunked out into a parking lot somewhere to be found by a grandfather and young girl. Shortly, Mika's friend's father and the girls who were teasing Mika (cause they feel bad now.) are out with flyers, too. They pass by the park and see a girl walking. Mika! They jump out and run after her, only to find it is Mika's friend shambling around, cut ear-to-ear.
Meanwhile, Mika's mom is also playing detective, discovers the same thing (except she's running off nothing but rumors, asking all the children in town what they know). She speeds off into the night towards Childbeck Hill.
The teachers finally arrive at the house and begin exploring. The man, being haunted (heh) by his past, finds a knife... and remembers everything.
What really happened that day his mother disappeared:
After his siblings were gone, his mother came after him, punching him in the face. Realizing what she had done, she began crying and apologizing, because she was actually going crazy. Putting a knife in his hand, she asked him to chop her head off, because the next time she went crazy, he wouldn't make it out alive, just like his brother and sister. "Aim for the neck," she said. He hesitated. Flying in to a crazed rage again, she grabs an over-sized pair of scissors and barely misses him. She swings at him again, but this time, he swings back, slicing her beautiful face open. She collapses and he puts her body into a wardrobe and locks it up tight, but not before covering her ugly face with a mask and draping her with a rain coat, her scary-big scissors still in hand.
He killed her. And made her. Bad, bad boy!
((A side note: right before someone gets possessed, they are overwhelmed by a fit of coughing, as that is what happened moments before his mother would loose her mind and beat him. Everyone has a tell.))
Moving along, he decides that if he cuts off her head, he might be able to stop the insanity. But, opening the wardrobe, she's missing! No body of a dead lady, but a loose board reveals an entrance to a secret cellar he had never seen before. They check it out and find Mika! Yay, Mika is alive and safe, hanging out next to two skeletons, a boy and a girl. (Wonder who they could be? That's right! His brother and sister!)
I'll make the next part quick.
They get Mika untied. The ghost comes back and starts slashing people and kicking people. Mika's mom arrives and gets stabbed. Ghost lady's son (teacher) gets stabbed. Ghost lady gets stabbed in the back by the lady teacher and dies. Ghost possesses Mika's mom! Son grabs ghost mom and proceeds to battle it out with her while the teacher lady and Mika escape, but not before watching him saw her head off.
Another earthquake seals them in the cellar like a tomb, and the two girls escape, fairly unharmed. Very, very traumatized. (That's what happens when ghosts try to kill you. Especially the Japanese kind. Those are extra spooky.)
The movie ends with the teacher getting to see her daughter again to apologize and ask forgiveness. And her daughter hugs her and shows that she does not hate her. Suddenly, she begins coughing savagely...
Oh, and did I mention that the movie goes back to the pile of dead people in the cellar to show us the disembodied head of.. Mika's mom!
You can't stop Japanese ghosts. Those fuckers are undeadable!
I give this movie... a 3.5/5.
Why?
I love Japanese horror. I think it's the best kind. Their ghosts are strangely horrifying, ghost stories are super creepy, and their horror games, well, I can't even begin with that. :) Japan, you have my heart.
I have been waiting to get a copy of this movie to watch, because I've always been interested in the particular story of Kuchisake-onna, and I was really excited to find it on my Netflix. (Netflix is new to me, shaddup.) The story was full of twists and turns, and the imagery was very discomforting, which is a good thing. There was no shortage of child maimage and violence. I mean, the dead boy the grandfather found looked like he definitely had a rough time. And the ghost lady had a love of kicking children in the face with heels.
I would also like to add that the altercations between the adults, meaning the teachers/parents and the ghost lady was a little more realistic than what is normally portrayed on horror movies. We're used to seeing an insane amount of courage displayed by the adults as they race to save their children, or someone's children they are trying to rescue. The behavior of the adults had much more hesitation, confusion and sloppy fighting, much what we would expect from normal people of the public.
However...
This movie was about child abuse! Everyone one involved was either beaten or did the beating. Are you serious? Sigh... I'm not super crazy about people sneaking morals into my horror films.
And the story told by the movie really had nothing to do with the legend. At all. The legend is about a vain woman, disfigured, and on a path of vengeance to do to others what was done to her. The whole point of the legend is that she greets a stranger with, "Watashi kurei?" and then decides whether or not she thinks they should live. The lady in the movie just really hated kids, I guess. The voice in her son's head was the only mention of "Am I pretty?"
A little disheartening if you ask me...
I liked the movie, and thought it was a good story, full of twists and controvercial violence, not to mention spooky ghost lady's with a gaping maw.
I feel like I just watched Silent Hill: The Movie all over again. A happy tingling of creepy Japanese-based awesome, but they took my beloved story and kinda ran away with it. In the wrong direction.
My analysis:
To be considered great, you must first remove it from the original expectations and anticipation. Once that is done, and you are no longer expecting a specific set of events and storyline, it stands alone as something pretty nice.
Until next time.
//pookie & muzzy//
