One Missed Call (2008/Warner Blu-ray)

 

Picture: B+     Sound: B+     Extras: D     Film: D

 

 

One Missed Call marks yet another film in the tired trend of recycling Asian horror films and dumbing them down for American audiences and one can only hope there is an end in sight.  Chakushin Ari (2003) this is not, although for those that are interested this would be the better film to see, especially as it will expose new viewers to Takashi Mike, who is one of Japan’s premier filmmakers and brings originality to the horror genre.

 

For all the originality that Japan is creating, Hollywood is undoing as they gutted out formations and concoctions are aimed primarily at the new MTV generation.  What’s a shame is that these films are also taking down many young talents, this time Shannyn Sossamon, Azura Sky, and Johnny Lewis.  The problem with the film begins with the lame reworked script by Andrew Klaven and then transfers over to the poor amateur-ish directing of inexperienced filmmaker Eric Valette.  Nothing can save the film after it gets going, especially when the PG-13 rating keeps the film so tame that even some gore can’t bring about some life and excitement.  Even the actors seem bored, but I can’t blame them. 

 

The synopsis for the film doesn’t sound that bad and actually seems like it could work, if handled well. Beth Raymond witnesses the deaths of two of her friends in gruesome fashion, but even more interesting is that they had received phone calls that gave the details of their deaths.  Everyone thinks that Beth is crazy except for one cop, who together they must solve the crazy crimes.  Sound familiar?  If the film had rolled heavier on the suspense aspect instead of trying to ‘scare’ us then it may have worked, but like many of these recycled horror films the biggest problem is that the concept is never flushed through the entire film.  It’s almost as if they have a great idea, but once they realize that they need to make that idea work for 90-minutes, then all hope is lost. 

 

Warner’s 25GB Blu-ray for the film features a 1.85 X 1 anamorphic widescreen presentation in true 1080p High Definition video and VC-1 codec, but no matter how good the presentation looks it can’t save the run-of-the-mill cinematography or loop-holed plot.  There are only a few scenes that seem a bit soft by HD standards and are most noticeable on close-up shots of cell phones, which happens quite a bit in this film, thus the title of the film.

 

The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix is also quite adequate, but again no matter how solid it just can’t save this bomb.  It’s really unfortunate too because the sound design, while not necessarily original, does have some good sonic qualities that better films don’t always get.  There are no extras, but I don’t think they’ll be missed and as for missing something, well, this is one phone call you don’t want to take.

 

 

-   Nate Goss