The
success of Ringu and its subsequent remake The Ring
means we are in for a storm of import horror pictures. Fortunately,
we are at the start of this trend and so there are some good pictures
for distributors to pick from before we get down to the meat of
the blandwagon. On the vanguard of this art house boom is the
Pang Brothers’ The Eye, a creepy take on an old story that
promises more than it delivers.
After a good little
scare to throw the audience off balance, the picture settles
into what can only be described as low-key creepy. A blind girl,
Mun (Angelica Lee), goes under the knife, receiving a corneal
transplant. As she begins to slowly recover her sight, she befriends
a little girl with a brain tumor named Ying-ying (Yut Lai So).
One night Mun sees an old lady leave her bed with a thin shadowy
figure. Following into the hall, a white faced woman startles
Mun while complaining about the cold.
All but the truly
horror-illiterate know that we are in an “I see ghosts” picture.
The nice twist is that at least Mun has an excuse for not putting
it together right away. She doesn’t know that women don’t walk
around with their faces painted white, or that people in the
dark don’t appear to be in soft focus. Her first real clue that
things are wrong comes in the morning with the news that the
old woman has passed away.
She takes the “that’s
odd but let’s move on” denial approach, but as creepier and
creepier things happen to her, she starts to understand that
things are amiss. Set against this horror staple, Mun’s story
of trying to fit back into her new life with sight fascinates.
Newly blessed with a full set of senses, she finds almost nothing
but hardships. She finds herself no longer welcome in the orchestra
for the blind and she can’t recognize everyday items without
touching them. To help her with the second problem she is sent
to handsome Dr. Wah (Lawrence Chou), a psychologist who will
help her relearn her “visual vocabulary.”
Filled with a bunch
of great creep-outs and even a few good stings, The Eye
builds an interesting atmosphere and opens many doors for the
plot to travel down. The problem comes with the start of Act
III, when the picture ditches the entire first hour for a lame
attempt at a conclusion which doesn’t take all that well, and
then, out of desperation, an unnecessary action sequence. While
this huge misstep doesn’t ruin the picture it does keep it from
rising above good into great. Of course, the way the last few
years of cinema have gone we’ve learned to lower our standards
so that ‘good’ is good enough.
So many unused themes
are introduced that mentioning them just seems like a waste
of time. Mun plays the violin, an instrument of inexact interpretation
much like her slowly healing eyes. Her conductor even refers
to her as Ms. Tone Deaf at one point, but this idea that she
is “playing” her eyes incorrectly seems to be there but buried
and unexploited. Completely unexplored is the idea that Mun’s
corneas are actually from a dead person. Instead the picture
goes with an explanation which doesn’t fit with the rest of
the picture.
Roger Corman’s classic
X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes plays on some of these
themes and The Eye’s slow, talky beginning plays a lot
like the start of the classic. Much like our Wachowski Brothers,
The Pangs drip with directorial style but their overall scripting
leaves more than a little to be desired.
Like the classic
jazz quote the Pangs know how important empty space is in a
story about what is and isn’t there. One particularly memorable
sequence comes when Mun sees an old man in her elevator but
when she checks the security monitors he is gone.
As mentioned before,
some great doors are opened by this picture but The Pangs don’t
use what they have. This lack of economy keeps The Eye
out of the must-see realm, but it’s still certainly worth a
viewing for horror fans and Hong Kong fans alike.
Maybe some of these
problems will be fixed in the inevitable American remake, but
the way this year has been going I’m not expecting much for
the next decade or so. “I’ve seen too much” is obviously a dramatic
theme that goes back quite a ways and The Eye has a good
tragic/happy ending when all the cards are in. But the way we
finally get there disappoints.