Pulse Critics Choice 2025
Genre
SPECIAL PROGRAMME
Release Date
5 Jul 2025 (Sat)
Category
--- (HK), ---(Macau)
Running Time
119 Minutes
Language
Japanese
Subtitle
Chinese and English
Director
Kurosawa Kiyoshi
Cast
Aso Kumiko, Kato Haruhiko, Koyuki, Arisaka Kurume, Yakusho Koji
Synopsis
Welcome to the internet. Riding on the wave of J-horror brought on by RING (1998), Kurosawa Kiyoshi follows technological trend by updating an age-old formula for a new era. After all, a virus attached to a video tape can’t possibly infect people more effectively than an invisible virus spread on the internet. As the apocalypse is spread in the blink of an eye, it turns out that driving force isn’t hatred, but loneliness and the inherent emptiness of modern civilisation. Like the dots that appear in the film without a line connecting them, bizarre clues don’t bring us any closer to the truth. Flesh and blood on the wall suddenly become a dark two-dimensional shadow as invisible phantoms become tangible through internet broadband cables. The sinister presence hiding in an abandoned space slowly appears in front of our eyes. Continuing the use of experimental lighting and sound editing techniques of CURE (1997) and SÉNANCE (2000), this film opens a door to spiritual experiences for the Asian successors of slow cinema in the new century.
Welcome to the internet. Riding on the wave of J-horror brought on by RING (1998), Kurosawa Kiyoshi follows technological trend by updating an age-old formula for a new era. After all, a virus attached to a video tape can’t possibly infect people more effectively than an invisible virus spread on the internet. As the apocalypse is spread in the blink of an eye, it turns out that driving force isn’t hatred, but loneliness and the inherent emptiness of modern civilisation. Like the dots that appear in the film without a line connecting them, bizarre clues don’t bring us any closer to the truth. Flesh and blood on the wall suddenly become a dark two-dimensional shadow as invisible phantoms become tangible through internet broadband cables. The sinister presence hiding in an abandoned space slowly appears in front of our eyes. Continuing the use of experimental lighting and sound editing techniques of CURE (1997) and SÉNANCE (2000), this film opens a door to spiritual experiences for the Asian successors of slow cinema in the new century.
