Michi (Kumiko Asô) is sent to her co-worker Taguchi’s apartment to retrieve some work files. He’s behaving very strangely and then hangs himself while she’s in the other room. Or did he? Was he a ghost before she even knocked on the door? Meanwhile, Ryosuke (Haruhiko Katô), a caveman college student decides to check out the Internet for the first time (to look for porn, presumably) and finds a website that asks him: “Do you want to meet a ghost?”
Understandably creeped out, Ryosuke goes to computer science major Harue (Koyuki) to find out what the heck he’s stumbled upon. Things only get more mysterious from there as it turns out the Internet is haunted! Why are there waves of mass suicides happening all over Japan? What do these ghosts want and will humanity survive their revolt?
As everyone who lived through the 1990s knows, the only thing scarier than ghosts is dial-up. Director and writer Kiyoshi Kurosawa had already proved himself as a talented force to be reckoned with after films like Cure, Charisma, and Séance. Then he directed Pulse and it was a game changer. I can’t think of another film to compare this to other than Sion Sono’s Suicide Club but that’s unfair to both films. I can only futilely put two unique directors’ films next to each other and shrug my perilously Caucasian shoulders.
The wave of Japanese horror was already underway, with Ringu having come out just a few years earlier, but this masterful and very intelligent film has a lot to say about human nature and the dangers of technology. It’s almost as if Kurosawa had seen the future when he wrote this. Did people in 2001 already understand the malaise and the deception of connectivity that the Internet has given us?
Composer Takefumi Haketa creates one of the most oppressive, otherworldly, and deliriously terrifying scores I've ever heard. The single operatic female voice amidst all of the din is quite unsettling. Cinematographer Jun'ichirô Hayashi flawlessly creates spaces where humans are very low on the food chain and eloquently captures the dizzying loneliness and isolation of modern life. The cast are excellent and portray very likeable and very doomed characters that I immediately sympathize with. Despite their emotionally distant personality traits, I care what happens to these people. This is an apocalyptic movie that never forgets the little details.
When people find out about my horror movie obsession, they often ask my wife this question: “What is the scariest movie that Richard ever showed you?” Her answer is always the same: Kairo. I would be remiss if I didn't mention her specific fear of this film which is how the ghosts move. Their slow motion and marionette-like movements freak her out. What Kurosawa understands perfectly in regards to scaring his audience is with how these spirits move through our world. Their alienness and weirdly perfect intangibility is terrifying. And while the technology onscreen may be dated, the message of this timeless classic is still the same: get off the fucking Internet. Be careful with this one, kids. Once the dread creeps in, it lingers.
