Asian Horror, All Wrapped Up: January 2020

ThirTEEN Terrors, GMM 25, 2014

If you’ve seen me on the feeds or seen any article I’ve written before, you’ll know I’m a massive horror fan. Asian horror, Western horror, whatever it is, I’m going to give it a go. I’m working my way through countless horror lists dotted around the web, and whatever recommendation you need, I have one for you.

In a month, I tend to watch on average twenty films, and fifteen of these are usually horror. With people always asking me for some horror film recommendations, I decided to try a new format out: Asian Horror, All Wrapped Up.

In this monthly article I’ll bring together my favourite that I watched that month, my two films and/or series that took me totally by surprise, my least favourites and a recommendation list of Asian and Western horrors to give a try. I’m also giving you a bonus “skip if you value your time” and a short horror film recommendation list as well... and some extras.
At the bottom of each article, you can find the Asian (and western remake) releases for the month.

If it has the tag horror, it's fair game for this article! Whether it's horror-comedy, horror-romance, idol acted horror, no matter what! Western titles are all linked to the movie database, and you can find the links in the medias' posters! Every film mentioned has been updated as much as it possibly can be for this article. Linked reviews will take you to my Letterboxd reviews for non-Asian content. Manga/anime links out to MyAnimeList. Western films have only been included if they are an 8-10/10 rating or directly linked to Asian horror (e.g. remakes, Resident Evil which is adapted from the original Japanese games, etc.).

I heard you, I took note of people asking me for recs and here we are. Jam-packed full of all the horror one could ask for, With that being said, let’s start this Asian Horror bonanza!

Personal Favourites

SeriesKingdom South Korea 6 episodes 51 minutes 8.7/10 from 5,071 users

FilmThe Eye Hong Kong (-Singapore) 1 hour, 38 minutes 7.3/10 from 314 users

I said at the start of this article if you know me – well, again, if you know me, you’ll know I very rarely watch dramas. I’ve completed eight in my time on the site because I find a lot just too hard to get into. I took a big risk with this one; I put Kingdom as my personal favourite series on this article before I had even finished watching episode one. This was, quite possibly, one of the best Korean horror decisions I have made in my life. Let me summarise this in two words for you: historical zombies. So, I'm not very big on the zombie genre myself. I have a few films I've seen, but nothing that's massively really made me go "oh my god this is it". 28 Days Later came pretty close but nowhere near as much as Kingdom has. This has all the tropes but done right, this had me on the edge of my seat for most of it's run time, with just a light topping of comedy and justice to make you cackle as it goes on. Never have I been so invested in a horror series before and I'm mad at myself for not waiting until season 2 airs, coming out in March - Kingdom 2. 100% give this one a try; it's worth it, and it was well, well deserving of its hype. (Although, trust me, it's probably better to save this for the day before/day the second season releases; I am going up the wall waiting.)

Okay, I know 7.3 doesn't seem like a very high rating for a film promoted as the best film I watched this month but I actually truly loved this film. I watched it due to using a gif from it in my Me Vs My Anti-Horror Friends article, and people couldn't believe I hadn't seen it, so I went ahead and said screw it. This is so reminiscent of 2000s Asian horror, it gave me such nostalgia I got chills. This had the right balance between suspense and horror. The storyline was wonderful and really unique, and the story itself made my heart bleed quite a few times. My only qualm is that the graphics are pretty bad, but it is 2002. It's best to view this film in the mindset you'd have gone to the cinema in the 2000s to watch a film to have the best view of this film. Nostalgic to a degree for those who have seen a lot of 2000s era horror, an awesome look into Hong Kong and Singapore's horror culture and with a plot twist and ending that had me tearing up, 100% recommend giving this one a try.

Shining Surprises

Country: Thailand Average Rating: 7.9/10 from 268 users Personal Rating: 8/10 Duration: 45 minutes Episodes: 13

Country: Taiwan(-Malaysia) Average Rating: 8.5/10 from 90 users Personal Rating: 8/10 Duration: 50 minutes Episodes: 6

ThirTEEN Terrors

My first shining surprise for January is the Thai drama ThirTEEN Terrors. This is a collection drama with thirteen different horror stories surrounding thirteen different sets of teenagers. Except for episode four – Unsolicited Calls – I really enjoyed all of these. The thirteenth episode fell a little flat – The Blue Hour – but it was an adapted version of the film The Blue Hour by the same director and probably advertisement for it. I recommend giving the film a try! The acting in episode eleven was a little wooden, but the concept of the episode was still unnerving enough to make me paranoid and hear footsteps.

Other than episodes four and thirteen, all of these were brilliant. They shocked me, made my skin prickle, made me a little paranoid in my own home. I enjoyed this thoroughly, and in the future when I’ve forgotten a lot of the little details, I’m definitely going to re-watch this and enjoy it in full once more.

Ghost Bride

I actually came across The Ghost Bride writing this article – the first thing I did was the release chart and when I noticed this came out on Netflix on the 23rd. So when I woke up on the 23rd, I made my coffee, opened Netflix and kicked back. The opening immediately dragged me in, so I sat back and binged it throughout the day.

This isn't quite a horror in terms of scary and more so horror in terms of ghosts are present, but I found this really enjoyable. The romance is sweet enough and spread out enough to not be a deal-breaker for me. The plot twists well and is written out brilliantly that I found it incredibly enjoyable.  

The characters are wonderful, I felt for all of them. I fully enjoyed the story blossoming and spreading out, and I truly hope there’s a season/volume 2 of this series. If there is, I’ll be there on episode drop day as soon as I’m awake to have another binge.

Give this one a try – it truly surprised me as it has some aspects I wouldn’t ever really watch. A solid 8/10 from me and even be potentially re-watchable in the future.

Short Film Feature

A Function Country: South Korea Average Rating: 6.7/10 from 8 users Personal Rating: 9/10 Duration: 9 minutes Dir: Lee Hyeon Soo In a classroom, a girl is sitting on the desk, solving a math quiz. If she cannot solve it in time, a horrible thing is likely to happen. The clock is ticking, but the quiz is not likely to be solved. And her mechanical pencil breaks down. However, she has to solve the quiz. YouTube Link

Another thing that a few people will know about me is that I adore short films. I love a good binge of about seven films in about half an hour. They’re super fun, and I love looking through what so many directors have made for sharing with us via YouTube.

I found this short earlier this month, recommended to me by the wonderful acom who answered my call for help looking for short films.

In just 9 minutes, director Lee Hyeon Soo has created a wonderfully tense scene. The gore in this is absolutely stellar, and some theatrical releases would turn green with envy at the sight of the stunning special effects that he has had done. This is full of metaphors for the South Korean school system, and it truly stunned me just how many there are slotted perfectly together in only nine minutes.
If after watching, you’re unsure of the metaphors, there’s a wonderful comment on the YouTube video detailing everything out.

This one is for sure one of my favourite short films from all of Asia – give it a go, it’s less than ten minutes of your life. ;)

Here’s my Asian horror short film list if you want to check out more!

Least Favourite

Die a Violent Death Also known as Still Country: Thailand Release Date: January 28, 2010 Average Rating: 4.1/10 from 15 users Personal Rating: 2/10

You know when you're browsing Netflix at 3 am, and you come across a film, and it's either going to be tremendously terrible or tremendously brilliant? Die a Violent Death makes a new standard for "tremendously terrible".
Still, or as I know it, Die a Violent Death follows four different stories concerning murder from Thailand's newspaper headlines. This seemed like a very good premise; it had a lot of potentials, and I was quite happy to give it a go. Well, it's in the least favourites so you can tell what I thought about that.

This made me so bored, it drove me to clean my living room and knit – in fact even between cleaning and knitting, I managed to get one and a half scarves knitted whilst watching this omnibus. Still was choppy, there was no love or passion from the directors, the actors did... pretty badly, and some of these stories just infuriated me. I really only enjoyed one of the stories which were the very first one and past that... It was just a mess. The jumps between the stories weren't clear, some of them were just plain boring, and frankly, I couldn't stand watching this. The last story even made me consider making it my first piece of dropped media my entire life with only seven minutes remaining of it. 

Skip this one and go for something else. Thailand has some great horror and some terrible horror; this one was, unfortunately, the latter.

Overall Stats for January

Colour coding: spirit/ghoul/ghost, zombie, gore, urban legend, vampire, sub-genre not specific
Personal Rating vs MDL Rating

Asian horror films watched: 8
Asian horror series watched: 3
Asian horror shorts watched: 9
Non-MDL Asian region films watched: 2 - Indonesia
Western horror films watched: 5
Western horror series watched: 0
Total: 27

Asian Recommendations
Watch these, as soon as possible

• Occult - I went on a long binge of Shiraishi Koji's works this month and Occult is definitely one of my favourites. A mockumentary following Koji as he delves into a murder case, we are treated to a wonderfully twisting tale that takes us behind the scenes of the human psyche with a touch of spirits and ghosts. [7.5/10 vs 6.7/10 - Japan]
• CULT - Another mockumentary from Shiraishi Koji following a group of idols as they record and observe an exorcism of a house, this is twisting, ridiculous in a good way, and with some of the best acting I've seen for an idol acted horror. Another one of my solid favourites, this will be one I'll gladly re-watch numerous times in the future. [7.5/10 vs 6/10 - Japan]

Western Recommendations
(I know some of you want the good ones, I got you)

• 28 Days Later - Technically cheating as I didn't watch this in January, but I mentioned it when discussing Kingdom and honestly, this film series is one of my all-time favourites. It's harrowing, it's chilling, it's a really realistic look into zombies. One of the best British horror films of all time; that's all I have to say. [8/10 - United Kingdom]
• The Grudge (2004) - Alright, I went there. With the hype around the new reboot that came out the 3rd of this month, I decided to finally give the American version a watch. I binged all 4, and you know what... this one wasn't too bad. Lots of neat little tricks the director pulled; still, only an average and I recommend the Japanese versions but, really, not too bad. Average at best, but if the Japanese versions are too much for you, this one might be better suited. [5/10 - United States - Review]
• Resident Evil: Retribution - Sighs. On one hand, I hate this series. The perfectly good game lore was right there. On the other hand, I adore this series. This is how you do zombies, and this is how you do jumpscares right. Maybe nostalgia is part of my rating but, oh boy, this series was the best. [7/10 - United States - Review]

Western No-Nos
Why did I trust them again?

• The Grudge 2 - So I did watch all the American versions after this, and it definitely gets worse as it goes on. This one holds out just enough to be mildly enjoyable with some new twists to the story but, past that, there's nothing much else. [3/10 - United States - Review]
• The Grudge 3 - I could write a novel on why to avoid this one but: boring, same plot nothing new, predictable and terrible ending, too much bad CGI, the entire franchise still left unexplained. Seriously, watch Ju-on instead. [1/10 - United States - Review]
• The Grudge (2020) - Ho boy, this was... a struggle to get through. I regret adding some Western pieces in here now, even as related to Asia as they are just because of this. Utterly terrible, the worst film I've watched in the horror genre. I've never seen a film rip off a franchise and rip off the existing rip-offs at the same time. [1/10 - United States - Review]

Short Film Recommendations
Some of these master horror more than theatrical releases, go on, give them a go

• FEEL - A horror-comedy short that's full of satire and made me laugh harder than I have in a while. Ryo Moroe shows talent in her shorts and the actors in this did everything perfectly. She's a director I am 100% keeping an eye on in the future. [8.5/10 vs 7.5/10 - Japan - YouTube]
• Ghost Machine - Part of the collective film Horror Stories III, Ghost Machine was released on YouTube as it's own official horror short. 25 minutes follows a chilling story of an outdated babysitting robot becoming obsessed with his family. One of my all-time favourite shorts that just missed the catch to the feature by a function, if you have half an hour to spare, definitely give this one a shot. It made me paranoid, and it's a really well-done piece. [8/10 - South Korea - YouTube]
• 11:55 PM - This as a really good build-up and had me quite tense and shifting in my seat. Anxiety wreaking and with a great concept, definitely worth the 12-minute watch. [7.5/10 - South Korea - YouTube]
• Comforter - I found this one by chance on a YouTube binge. It's a short one with a plot that's pretty well used, but Hiroho Mieno makes a very tense 3 minutes. There isn't much more to say than that other than I recommend it. [7/10 - Japan - YouTube]
• Save Me - A hilarious little short, this is funny, sweet and emotional all in one. An utterly brilliant 10 minute short from Hong Seung Kyun. [8.5/10 - South Korea - YouTube]

Averages
Not terrible but not amazing either

• The Promise - I really did want to like this one, but as with a lot of Thai horror, this one didn't quite hit the mark. Amazing work by Sopon Sukdapisit and I look forward to checking his other works, but this one just missed it for me. [6/10 vs 7.1/10 - Thailand]
• The Wedding Curse - This was one of the first few Filo horrors that I've seen and I have to say, at first this was very promising. However, after the first thirty minutes... it just falls a bit flat. It gets a little boring, quite predictable after a well-done intro and I just couldn't finish it with the same gusto I started it with. Chito S. Rono has a good premise, but it just doesn't complete what was promised. [4.5/10 vs 6.8/10 - Philippines]
• Spirit Heart - Ryo Moroe's first short film. This isn't entirely amazing, or anything stunning, but I really enjoyed watching this to see where she came from and where she began her horror career. A little flat but the actors do well (save for one scene), but this was truly well done for a starter film. [5.5/10 - Japan - YouTube]
• Mr. Yamauchi Ozawa - The second part of Ryo Moroe's horror series, I found this to be the worst of her shorts, but it's not absolutely terrible. Again, another nice look to see where she began with horror and I quite enjoyed it; there's a nice plot going on, it just needed some better acting, I think. However, very average in terms of the rest of the content I've seen. [5/10 - Japan - YouTube]
• Brother- To be honest, I struggled with where to put this one. Another short film by Moroe, this one is very good and has a stunning plot twist, but a few things let it down which ended up with me putting it here. This was twisting, I didn't expect it and the make up effects were beautiful, but it didn't really chill me or make me feel any different as I watched it. [6/10 - Japan - Youtube]
• The 3rd Eye 2 - Pretty much the same as the first in the series with just a few different plot points, I felt really let down by this and like I'd just watched the same film twice. [5/10 - Indonesia - Review]
• The Sinners of Hell - This is one of those much older, first films that made a lot of difference in the genre. Maybe I was too tired when watching this to really appreciate it, but I found this really boring and couldn’t focus on it. I wouldn’t personally recommend it, but the MDL rating is pretty high, so it gets an average ranking. (Also wouldn’t call this a horror, but I guess for 1960, this was a horror). [3.0/10 vs 6.1/10 – Japan]

All Time Skips
Skip these ones if you value your time - trust me

• Ju-Rei: The Uncanny - I absolutely adore Shiraishi Koji, and it hurts to throw this here, but this was so boring I just couldn't focus. This seems to have ripped off other horrors, and it just doesn't flow properly. [4/10 vs 6.5/10 - Japan]
• Dead Waves - I watched this for a friend and all I have to say on this really is it's boring, it's ridiculous and it pretty much copied four other decent horror films. I only managed to finish watching this due to Wada Soko and his pretty face. I will definitely not be watching anything else by director Hayama Yoichiro; not willingly, at least. This was utterly ridiculous. [2/10 vs 5.6/10 - Japan]

Extras

Western Horror Must WatchHush (2016)	Non-MDL Asian PickThe 3rd Eye (2017) Indonesia *	Favourite Non-January Watch Lesson of the Evil (2012)
Horror Manga Pick Hideout (2010)	Horror Anime Pick Corpse Party, Tortured Souls (2013)	Non-Horror Monthly Pick Boku dake ga Inai Machi (2017)

*The 3rd Eye does not have the best graphics; I recommended it for the story and the special effects

January Releases

	Stare Japan January 10, 2020	Dead bodies with eyeballs ruptured are continuously found. Their direct causes of death are heart attacks, and they acted like they were possessed right before their deaths. Mizuki is a university student. Her friend dies in front of her. Meanwhile, Haruo’s younger brother dies. Mizuki and Haruo begin to investigate together. They learn that Eiko holds the key to the mystery. Soon, Eiko's eyeballs rupture and she dies by a heart attack. Before she dies, she mentions the word "Shirai-san.”
A group of high school students is forced into a game where they are hypnotized to commit suicide on an unknown command. Where no one is safe from sudden death, how can they avoid their fates?	Signal 100 Japan January 24, 2020
	Living With a Ghost South Korea 16 episodes January 31, 2020	A young man and a woman who have become ghosts due to their mistakes from their previous lives go out on an interesting mission for a chance to be reincarnated after paying the price.
Set in 1890, a young woman was forced to marry a dead man like a ghost bride in exchange to have her family's financial debt forgiven. Her attempt to escape the obligation was complicated by her discovery of a conspiracy that was much bigger and more mysterious than she ever thought she would be in.	The Ghost Bride Taiwan 6 episodes January 23, 2020
	Mue Prab Khao Saan Sek Thailand Episodes Unknown January 6, 2020	Synopsis not currently available
After the death of his father, Kawin returns to Thailand from abroad to take over the wig factory. In search of material, he finds Warunee, the owner of a beauty salon, who introduces him to Gaysinee, a model with long silky hair that advertises shampoo. Kawin asks Gaysinee to sell her hair to him, but the girl flatly refuses. Years pass Kawin's business lives and thrive. One day, he finds a strand of hair that suspiciously reminds him of Gaysinee. Kawin instructs his staff to make a wig out of this hair, but everyone who wears this wig falls victim to mysterious incidents.	Pom Arthun Thailand Episodes Unknown January 13, 2020
	The Grudge United States of America January 3, 2020	After a young mother murders her family in her own house, a detective attempts to investigate the mysterious case, only to discover that the house is cursed by a vengeful ghost. Now targeted by the demonic spirits, the detective must do anything to protect herself and her family from harm. [themoviedatabase]