Kuroyuri danchi
Director: Hideo Nakata
Writer: Ryûta Miyake, Jun’ya Katô
Cast: Atsuko Maeda, Hiroki Narimiya, Masanobu Katsumura, Naomi Nishida, Kanau Tanaka
Part of: /slash Filmfestival

Plot:
Nursing student Asuka (Atsuko Maeda) just moved into a new apartment with her parents and her younger brother and so far only met a young boy on the playground. But there are weird noises coming from the apartment next door that only Asuka seems able to hear. Nevertheless she ventures into the neighboring apartment the next day, only to find her neighbor dead. When she meets the handyman Sasahara (Hiroki Narimiya) he tells her that there have been several deaths in the building and brings in a spiritualist to help Asuka.

I expected much from a movie by Hideo Nakata, but unfortunately I was rather disappointed. It has beautiful moments but the longer it goes on, the more boring it gets.

There’s no doubt that this is a visually excellent film. The colors were very nice and the lighting was fantastic. The apartment complex was pretty creepy, whereas the apartment itself mostly was a haven of light, which was beautifully done. And that’s not even mentioning the flashier sequences that were really great, too.

Atsuko Maeda was fantastic in the role of Asuka as well. She has to go through several transitions and each phase works without any problems.

But unfortunately the rest of the film didn’t work at all. My hearing isn’t excellent, but sometimes this movie got so loud that I would have been more at ease sitting in the next room instead of rather close to the screen.

The worse thing of all, though, was that Nakata just couldn’t keep up the tension. Towards the end of the film, I was bored, it was too loud and I just wanted it to be over. That’s not the feeling I want when I watch a film.

Summarizing: Maybe at home when you’re in charge of the volume yourself. But even then, nah.