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Mattie's
boyfriend, Josh, has just committed suicide for
unknown reasons. Curious to find out the cause, Mattie
begins to investigate further into the matter, and it
seems like it's got something to do with Josh's computer.
With a string of strange suicides occurring all over the
world, Mattie starts to realize that maybe the ghosts
on Josh's computer are real. But what do they want? And
how is it connected to all the suicides?
Let me start off by saying that "Kairo" is one of my
all-time favourite horror movies so I've been dreading
this remake ever since I first heard about it. And
while some of my suspicions fell through, surprisingly
many did not. Critics have bashed this remake to pieces,
but the thing is, I don't think that Kairo was a movie
for everyone in the first place. Sure, Pulse is far
from as brilliant as Kairo was but does it deserve all
the negative reviews that it has gotten? No! This is
a far better remake than say "The Fog" and "When A
Stranger Calls" and I actually thought that it was
surprisingly decent (keep in mind though, I went in
with the lowest expectations possible).
As much as I hate the fact that it's been cut down to
PG-13 (leaving the memorable jump from water-tower
scene on the cutting table), PG-13 horror flicks are
here to stay and unfortunately there's nothing us real
horror fans can do about it. The fact that Pulse has
an all-teen cast definitely worked against it, removing
the seriousness of the original movie. If you don't
know the story it's basically about ghosts that move
through electronic hardware, such as computers and cell
phones, and suck the will to live out of people.
This may sound like a silly plot but what made it work
for Kairo was that it focused more on how showing us
how we're secluding ourselves more and more from the
outside world rather than scaring the hell out of us.
Pulse on the other hand takes a different approach and
copies heavily from "The Grudge" by trying to scare
its audience with flashy effects and loud noises.
Unfortunately it doesn't work very well. The suspense
from the original movie is all gone and while most of
my favourite scenes are in here, they're just not as
effective. Pulse isn't quite as subtle as Kairo (well
there's the understatement of the year) and that's
Pulse's main problem (just look at the ashes in the
wind scene, far from as effective as it was in the
original movie, there's no drama here).
So what did I like about Pulse? This is really a hard
question for me to answer. The only thing that it
improves is the red line in the story. It's not as
diffuse as it was in Kairo and it was really easy to
follow (in other words, the movie has been dumbed down
for the American audience). Everything else about
this movie is much worse than the original, but since
the original's so brilliant, it still manages to
become a decent and mildly entertaining movie.
If you're not a fan of Kairo, you will hate Pulse but
if you are a fan of Kairo, you might be pleasantly
surprised about how decent this movie turned out to be.
Sure, the ghosts are a bit over the top (they're just
too CGI for my taste), but overall it stays relatively
true to the original. I'm still not sure why such a
sophisticated horror movie was turned into a scare-flick
for the MTV-generation, but either way, it could have
ended up being a whole lot worse. On a rainy night this
is a mildly enjoyable way to kill some time, but I
still think that you should stick to the original.
Nope, nothing here.
ROCK MUSIC!? IN KAIRO!? Yeah, that upset me a bit. The
suspense score didn't work at all and the soundtrack
was overall below average.
While far from as brilliant as the original, Pulse is
still a surprisingly decent horror movie, obviously
aimed at the "The Grudge" crowd. If you didn't like
the original, I can assure you that you won't like
this, but if you're a fan of the original (like I am),
I actually think that this is one of the few remakes
worth checking out.
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