Tokyo Urban Legend Review

Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!

Plot Summary: An anthology of four, unrelated horror tales.

Review: This is a case of good ideas with absolute shit execution. The stories aren't exactly groundbreaking in the first place, however, just when things are building up the segments crash and burn. More noticeable is that there is no clear direction--no through line as a guiding principle to help each story. So we have no wrap around, no common plot themes, and the segments range from 5 to 30 minutes long arbitrarily. This feels more akin to a collection of random internet videos than a legitimate anthology. The only noticeable commonality is the camerawork...that's about it. In fact, the very title itself is nonsensical since none of the stories take place in Tokyo (from what I can tell), and only the last tale involves an urban legend. The fuck? Oh well, let's take a look at what we get here.

Roommate: Honestly things don't start off too bad. Two girls, Yumi and Kasumi, share an apartment together, but aren't necessarily friends. Yumi discovers that Kasumi is banging her ex-boyfriend, and the two split up seemingly. Sometime later it becomes obvious that Yumi is dead, but she returns as a Kayako-clone. We learn that the boyfriend killed Yumi, because she was going to blab that he was nailing both chicks. He ain't that good looking. So his response is to also kill Kasumi while Kayako-Yumi watches. The end? Uh okaaaaay. Don't these ghosts usually want revenge? Well, yes, apparently she just wanted Kasumi to die more than her own murderer. In hindsight, at least this segment had a resolution so it's probably the best of the bunch sadly.

Lottery: This story pissed me off the most. Some guy realizes he's won the lottery and is trying to figure out a way to hide the ticket until he can cash it. This segment is actually quite funny. Unfortunately, right when you think this is gonna be a dark comedy story, the guy has some dude knocking on his door that he doesn't want to talk to. Then the camera pans back to the guy's closet and his own dead body is in there. The end! No, FUCK YOU! This segment is mere minutes long and is an incomplete failure. Who the hell would be okay with creating this? So his ghost is imagining this? Or we are seeing the future where the door-man kills the main guy for the ticket? Well, if it's the latter, then that is fucking horrendous editing!

Woman with the Bandaged Face: Now this is the kind of story that fits a Japanese urban legend, yet, they don't present this story coherently. Two sisters, apparently living without their parents, start to notice bloody trash bags outside, and the younger sister sees this creepy woman dropping the bags off. Covered in these bandages, the younger sister is rightfully alarmed especially when she keeps staring down the sister. There are these interludes between scenes of what appears to be the older sister in a chatroom or something. The story sets up this notion that the older sister is either the bandaged woman or wants the bandaged woman to kill the younger sister. But neither of these options occur which, once again, removes any kind of payoff. Instead, the bandaged woman literally teleports into the kitchen and kills both sisters. The segment ends with more internet chatter as if this explains the idiocy we have been shown. They even speculate if the bandaged woman was a ghost since she teleported but try and claim a clever person could have done it. Yeaaah, so clever you discovered a way to walk through a wall. What the fuck is even happening in this movie?! At least the older sister was a babe!

Her name is Kaori Tsubaki for anyone curious.

Suicide High School: Finally, wrapping things up is the only story to involve an urban legend. Unfortunately, it borders on pretentious and has a nonsensical ending which appears to be the true theme of this movie. Yet again, we have two sisters except this time one is making a documentary, or something, while the other is the one supplying the material. The gist is that some girl was bullied, committed suicide, and now her ghost supernaturally attracts other girls to the school to kill themselves. The older sister and her partner dig up the details on the story and eventually find the rumored school. While filming, the two see ghost girl and she shows them her true story which was actually her murder and body hidden by a teacher. I mean, it's a super cliched tale, but I can accept it. However, they couldn't just stop there, could they? When you think things are over, the younger sister appears and wants to commit suicide because she's being bullied too? I don't know! We are given no context or evidence for this shit, and the older sister doesn't seem to be trying to stop it either which was moronic. Then we cut to a TV on a stairwell with a wannabe PSA about anti-bullying while the credits roll. Come again? Seriously, what the hell is happening with this movie?!

Overall, this film is a mess from start to finish and severely lacking where it matters most. While the general premises behind each segments were interesting, or even fun, the segments fail to deliver every single time in such a way as to infuriate the viewer. The running time is relatively short as well so I think there could have been a wraparound of some sort to tie things up better. Hell even something as basic as someone sitting around reading about each segment in a tabloid about urban legends could have enhanced the experience. It just feels like so little effort was put into anything. This is an easy skip unless a particular story piques your interest for whatever reason.

Notable Moment: In the "Lottery" story when the guy says thanks and goodbye to the picture of his girlfriend and places it face down. I don't know, that shot of her goofy face made it seem like an homage to Buzz's girlfriend in "Home Alone." Man, they could have done so much with the tale but decided it was only worth 5 minutes. Good lord.

Final Rating: 4.5/10

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