film criticism by maryann johanson | celebrating 25 years: 1997–2022
Is it just that violence overall has increased in movies since 1950? Have we become a more despairing society since then? Is there something else at work?
In Case 39, Renee Zellweger plays a social worker who rescues a child (Jodelle Ferland) from abusive parents only to discover that perhaps it was the demon child who was abusing her guardians. This flick sprang from (among other films)…
Horror films have their own special guidelines when it comes to plausibility: basically, there aren’t any. And the Japanese flick *Ju-on: The Grudge,* which had a limited American release earlier this year, takes even greater liberties in the credibility area than most. Fortunately, writer/director Takashi Shimizu has enough tricks up his sleeve to make you forget that he’s not making one whit of sense. Logic is never a strong deciding factor, anyway, when you’re looking for a flick to give you goosebumps, which this one does, if only in moderate measure. Plus, creepy as it sporadically is, you can poke fun at it, too: The rage is coming from inside the house!
