User Reviews

Yogen begins with a tight sequence full of foreboding. A married couple with their young daughter are driving home from vacation when the father, Professor Hideki Satomi, needs to send an email. To get an internet connection they stop at a phone booth, and whilst waiting for his email to connect Hideki receives a shocking premonition. He discovers a newspaper depicting his daughter Nana's death: she dies in a car explosion, alone, after an impact by a lorry. He spots the date - it's today's - he sees the time - it's now - it happens right behind him, his wife Ayaka having tried unsuccessfully to release Nana from the back seat. This opening is suspenseful and subsequently sets a high expectation for the rest of the film.

We now travel three years into the future where Hideki and Ayaka are divorced, their marriage not having survived the horrific experience and aftermath of Nana's death. Their continuing relationship is explored with surprising depth: no character is wholly blamed for past events and both leads are written believably and with sympathy. Hideki soon becomes haunted with other premonitions, and with his ex-wife's help finds some answers about his own fate and others. This leads to the most disappointing part of the film, the meandering middle section, where audiences fidget and become eager for a pay-off.

It's worth the wait. With a journey into hell, one shocking sequence in particular and some genuine 'jump' moments, Yogen also manages to incorporate familiar concepts from films such as Groundhog Day and The Butterfly Effect. Despite this, the premise still feels fresh and the last twenty minutes deserve full attention.

I wouldn't classify Yogen solely as a horror, as the conventions of mystery, thriller and even some romance are also apparent. This film relies more on character development and a well thought-out (albeit sometimes slow) script than cheap shocks or blood and gore. With strong acting (most notably the stressed-out and suitably skinny performance from Hiroshi Mikami as Hideki), nicely crafted sequences and a pervading score, this film is predictable and unpredictable in equal measures. Admittedly uneven, if a viewer has enjoyed films of a similar premise, they can be confident Yogen ultimately delivers and entertains.

We learn from the DVD extras from an interview with the Director, that "Premonition" is based on a 30 year old Japanese horror novel titled "Fear Newspaper". The plot involves people who are sent newspapers from unseen forces that foretell the calamitous events or murders in the near future. Premonition reminds me of the 1944 American film "It happened tomorrow" where a man receives a copy of tomorrow's newspaper which predicts his own demise.

In this Japanese version, the protagonist is Hideki Satomi. He's a high school teacher obsessed with his work so when traveling on a vacation with his wife, Ayaka, and 5 year old daughter, Nana, the power fails on his notebook computer and he insists that his wife turn their car around and backtrack to a pay phone a few miles away where he can plug the computer into a power source and recharge the battery. As he's waiting for the battery to recharge inside the phone booth, his wife is having trouble extricating Nana from the car as the little girl's dress has gotten stuck inside the seat belt. Meanwhile, Hideki is dumbfounded when a burnt up piece of newspaper comes floating from the sky and rests in front of him inside the phone booth. The newspaper has a picture of his daughter with a caption announcing her death in a horrible accident. Seconds later, as Ayaka leaves the car and goes across the road to get Hideki to help her get Nana out of the car, a truck plows into the car, causing it to catch fire, explode and kill the hapless little girl.

Flash forward three years later. Hideki and Ayaka are no longer together (we later learn that Ayaka no longer wanted to hear about the mysterious newspaper that Hideki kept harping upon). Ironically, when the 'fear newspaper' (otherwise referred to as 'newspaper of terror') suddenly starts popping up in Hideki's life again predicting ghastly events, Hideki wants nothing to do with 'newspapers' and is oblivious to their clues; but Ayaka is now a researcher of psychic phenomena at the local university and is intent on getting to the bottom of what might have happened with the 'fear newspaper'.

Ayaka is working with an older woman, a psychic who uses her power to produce images on Polaroid (instant) film. The psychic tells Ayaka of a researcher, Rei Kigata, who has disappeared but prior to his disappearance discovered there is a place in the cosmos where all thoughts and memories coalesce. Certain people (like Hideki) become privy to incidents in the future through the fear newspaper which appear (as previously stated), out of nowhere. This is perhaps the weakest aspect of Premonition's story. Unlike the aforementioned "It happened tomorrow", where an old man delivers the newspaper, and there is some kind of relationship between the old man and the protagonist, the 'fear newspaper' arrives as a result from an unseen, vaguely defined force in the cosmos. It would have been much more compelling if there was some kind of devil-like figure that was delivering the newspaper instead of the random delivery which simply wasn't suspenseful.

Ayaka soon finds the psychic dead in her research laboratory. Meanwhile, Hideki is powerless to stop the murder of one of his teenage students despite receiving prior notification that the ghastly event will occur. Hideki continues to receive warnings of catastrophic events (such as a landslide) through the fear newspaper and again he's unable to do anything. We're even past the midpoint in the film and the central question is not asked—what can Hideki do to reverse the events that led to the death of daughter? Finally, Ayaka's research assistant finds the address of the mysterious Rei Kigata and Ayaka and Hideki go to visit him. However, when they arrive the house is deserted. By watching various old videotapes (some 12 years old), they see that Kigata attempted to alter the future interfering in the very events that are predicted to come true. We can see that Kigata begins developing plague-like symptoms on his body as a result of his meddling with the future.

Finally Hideki realizes that he can change fate but at a cost. Three quarters of the film is already over and finally a suspenseful event occurs. Hideki (after receiving another newspaper) prevents his wife from getting on a commuter train before it crashes and kills most everyone on board. However, Ayaka's research assistant was with her in the train and Hideki doesn't realize it when he pulls his ex-wife off onto the platform right before the train leaves the station.

Now Hideki finds himself caught in some kind of vortex where he's going backward in time. Before he knows it, he's back at the scene where his daughter was killed. He tries to interfere, saves the daughter but this time the wife is killed. Then he finds himself inside the cab of the truck with the truck driver who's had the seizure; again he can't stop the truck from plowing into his car. Finally, he remembers what the psychic had told him: you can change your own fate. This time 'he gets it'. He's able to save his daughter but must sacrifice his own life to save the little girl.

There's a ton of great material on the DVD extras including numerous scenes that show us how Premonition was made. I was impressed with the degree of cooperation between the director and the rest of the cast and crew. Nonetheless, director Norio Tsuruta resorts to introducing too many horror clichés (e.g. the drooling serial killer) at the expense of a tight and suspenseful plot. Without a clearly defined antagonist and the failure of the protagonist to be proactive throughout most of the film, Premonition fails to accomplish its goals: consistently scare its audience and keep it in a state of suspense.

As a horror movie, "Yogen" does disappoint -- the effects are hokey, and many aspects of the plot are poorly laid out (or not dealt with at all). But what impressed me about this film is, the human relationships are so real and moving, I kept forgetting I was watching a horror movie. I've rarely seen such powerful acting in a genre flick; the protagonist and his ex-wife are incredibly vulnerable and rawly expressive. I loved this movie in spite of its weaknesses. It emphasized the REAL reasons why horror scares us: because we fear the loss of love, because we feel guilty when bad things happen, because we fear being alone.

Never mind horror -- I cried when Hiroshi Mikami (the extraordinary actor who plays the protagonist) thought he heard his dead little girl calling his name, and his reactions -- shock, terror, disbelief, slowly rising hope, cathartic joy and sobbing relief, followed by horror, grief and anguish -- just broke my heart. Noriko Sakai, who plays his ex-wife, is equally powerful, especially in the scene where the estranged couple finally stop blaming themselves and each other, and come back together.

I very much hope we'll see more of these two wonderful actors, in films more worthy of their talents than this one. But this one isn't bad, by any means -- the screenplay, in particular, is a lot better than you usually get for a genre horror movie in translation. (A Japanese speaker might disagree with me there, but despite clunky subtitles, you could still get the gist of some pretty subtle and humane dialogue for a horror flick.) I'd recommend this movie for the acting, and again, I hope to see Hiroshi Mikami and Noriko Sakai in more, and better, films.

On his way back from a family outing with his wife Ayaka, and their young daughter Nana, Hideki - an intelligent and well respected high school professor - stops off on a lonesome stretch of road to use the payphone. Whilst waiting in the phone booth for a connection, he finds a strange scrap of newspaper foretelling of his daughter's imminent death. As he contemplates the page in absolute horror, Nana struggles to unbuckle her seat-belt. Seeking assistance, Ayaka crosses the street and taps on the glass. Hideki looks up, startled, when suddenly... a runaway truck ploughs into the couple's stationary car with their daughter still inside. Ayaka and Hideki run to the car, only to watch impotently as a fire ignites and the car bursts into flames. This startling opening sequence sets the wheels in motion for an enthralling supernatural thriller that deals specifically with the notions of guilt, fear and the broader implications of fate; as Hideki and Ayaka are left to join forces to further understand the mysteries of this seemingly spectral newspaper in light of a series of new and perhaps even more damaging premonitions.

The thing I like best about Japanese horror films of this particular type is the sense of atmosphere. The use of lingering, slow burning tension when a character approaches a closed door, and we know they shouldn't open it, but we still want them too, regardless! For me, it's everything that horror should be. No gratuitous gore, no shock MTV style montages, just a slow, lingering feeling of dread that grows with intensity from one scene to the next. It also helps that the majority of these films are directed with flair and imagination, while for the most part, offering us intelligent characters and interesting scenarios.

For me, Premonition (2004) is up there with some of the best supernatural/psychological horror films of the last ten years; with its combination of eerie plotting, gloomy images and emphasis on character as opposed to cheap thrills. You could always argue that the plot isn't entirely original, seeming like a veritable patchwork of ideas previously developed in films as disparate as The Dead Zone (1983), Final Destination (2000) and The Butterfly Effect (2004); with the usual themes and motifs recognisable from other, more iconic "J-Horror" films, such as The Ring (1998), Dark Water (2000), The Grudge (2000) and Reincarnation (2005), as well as other non-Japanese productions such as The Eye (2002), The Quiet Family (2000) and A Tale of Two Sisters (2003); all of which add to the overall sense of drama and suspense. Regardless, despite the familiarity of the plot and some of its ideas, Premonition still rewards the viewer with an air of creeping mystery, dread, fear and paranoia; as well as some skilfully executed moments of subtle horror and white-knuckle terror.

As with many Japanese films of this type, the central concept seems very much rooted in the traditions of old Japanese/Buddhist folktales; the kind of stories and fables that acted as the starting point for classic Japanese shock-cinema such as Kwaidan (1964), Onibaba (1964) and Kuroneko (1968), though with a modern-twist that recasts the idea of a newspaper that can predict future tragedies as more of a serious, unstoppable force; one that perhaps points to deeper, socio-political interpretations pertaining to the current state of Japan in the twenty-first century. Whether or not you choose to approach the film on any deeper, sub-textual level, will be entirely down to the individual, though there's still much to enjoy and take away from the film, even when approached as a straight, by the numbers horror.

Like all the great Asian horror films - or any great horror film at all for that matter - it is the story that pulls us in, but the great use of atmosphere that keeps us enthralled until the very end. Although some critical opinion has been mixed; no doubt due to the over-exposure of Japanese/Asian horror cinema over the last five or six years - and in particular from tepid American re-makes - I feel that Premonition is a genuinely good supernatural shocker that should appeal to anyone with an interest in "good horror" that doesn't involve buckets of blood and severed limbs. Alongside Premonition, you can also find two other films from the same producer, Taka Ichise, both of which cover similar stories and ideas as the film in question. These films, Infection (2003) directed by Masayuki Ochiai and Reincarnation (2005) directed by Takashi Shimizu, were meant to be part of the larger "J-horror" collection (involving different supernatural-themed films directed by some of Japan's most creative genre filmmakers), which, at the time of writing, has subsequently been aborted.

Regardless, if you like Premonition and appreciate the slow-burning sense of psychological and supernatural dread, then Infection and Reincarnation are both worth checking out, with both of those particular films capturing a similar, sinister mood that unfolds at a slow, lingering pace and works great, especially when experienced at around two o'clock in the morning; of course, just like the film in question.

Pretty much the only saving grace of this movie was the performance of bug-eyed, scenery-chewing actor Hiroshi Mikami in the lead. Beyond that and some unsettling dream-like sequences at the end of the movie, there's nothing to recommend here. Premonition is slow, the effects are nearly all laughably bad, the story is obvious, and the antagonist of the movie is (MINOR SPOILER HERE) a badly-animated dirty newspaper. (END SPOILER)

Viewers of American TV may be aware of a rather insipid syndicated show about a man who somehow gets the next day's paper delivered to him and then goes around trying to prevent trouble from happening. This is basically the plot of Premonition (and about a billion other bad science fiction stories). Mixed in with this is a very soap-operatic story of the protagonist and his wife trying to get over the loss of their child. The supernatural events which occur in the movie are never really explained, which would be fine if they were more mysterious to begin with, but since they are rather mundane anyways, the lack of an explanation seems like a let-down.

I could go on (in particular, about a scene where someone is stabbed, and the filmmakers decide to use CGI to show blood spreading under this person's clothing -- what, were you afraid to get fake blood on a sweater? Is there some kind of terrible sweater famine in Japan? Come on, people, this is the most rudimentary possible special effect, and it looks about a million times better than slapping some red on the film via After Effects or something). Suffice it to say that this film is a waste of time, and along with Infection (2004) represents an exceedingly poor start for the "J-Horror Theater" franchise.

A surprisingly good movie! When I first saw the box I didn't know what to expect. I figured it would be a low budget looking foreign film with blood and guts oozing everywhere. What I saw though, was a well crafted, suspenseful, chilling and bizarre film. At first the thought of a "killer newspaper" was kind of corny, but after watching this movie, it only makes the movie more appealing.

A guy is haunted by a newspaper that is called the "paper of death", which shows itself to random people detailing horrible deaths of people who are in their communities. A demon newspaper if you will. The main actor finds a newspaper clipping in a phone both that details his daughters death, that happens that same day. In horror he watches as his daughter is crushed in their car by a dump truck and explodes. From that point on the movie takes off on a bizarre trip into the supernatural while this lead character and his ex-wife try to uncover the source of this newspaper and the reason for their daughter's death.

There are some shocking images in the movie, like his wife being smashed by a truck on the side of the road, or when dead people start to contact him in all their gross dead states, one scene in particular shows a girl that has just died appearing to him in a hallway with her face ripped out of her head.

I would recommend this to anyone who is looking for a good foreign horror movie.