The Ring: Narcissism, Totalitarianism, and Intellectual Dissatisfaction

This review was published originally on cinekklesia on November 2, 2005.

Whenever one encounters a horror movie, he/she must grapple with seemingly arcane bits of trivia that are nevertheless central to the mechanics of the plot. For example, last week, a couple of co-workers and I were discussing zombies, specifically the genesis of said creatures. Do they arise solely from the ground, or can they also come into being through infection of non-zombies (usually via flesh wounds)? Do they maintain any of the individual characteristics they had as humans, or are they mere cogs in the meta-zombie consciousness — a consciousness resembling the Borg of Star Trek fame? And, freakier still, do zombies actually exist? (For a fun introduction, check out Wikipedia's entry on this topic.)

I was reminded of such questions when watching Gore Verbinski's The Ring (2002), a tale not about zombies, but rather, about an urban legend regarding a video tape of disturbing images. Anyone who watches the tape, the legend purports, will receive a phone call about his/her imminent demise seven days hence; of course, the recipients of such calls actually do perish at the appointed time.

Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts), a reporter for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, has a personal encounter with this tape when one of her relatives falls prey to its evil machinations. She then is asked by the victim's mother to get to the bottom of this whole scenario. Of course, part of her research involves watching the tape...and lo and behold, she, too, becomes threatened with death.

I won't expose the intricacies of the plot, but suffice it to say that Keller proves herself a talented reporter when she tracks down the images on the tape to a secluded island off the Washington coast. The haunting, of course, involves someone who was treated unjustly long ago and whose spirit seeks revenge...perpetually. On one level, one would expect that the aggrieved party would not rest until justice was served and then would fade away at the point of resolution. However, the astute viewer will notice that Verbinski gives us a classic false ending — just when we think the past has been amended, we learn (via the technologies of home entertainment) that the movie has at least 20 more minutes in which we witness how revenge is not only a dish best served cold, but served repeatedly.

Thus, while we initially may have sympathized with the plight of the spirit haunting The Ring, we later learn that she is nothing but a narcissist, demanding our attention at the threat of death. Think of a video chain letter gone horribly awry.

Unfortunately, The Ring proved disappointing because a friend of mine overhyped it. I mentioned this to my zombie-discussing co-worker, and she said that she had the same experience: Her friends had said that the movie frightened them to the point at which they were afraid to answer the phone for several days. However, such responses are puzzling. Sure, The Ring is tense and suspenseful, but assuming one views it with full knowledge that it is, after all, a horror flick, then there is no reason for one to become unduly frightened. (In fairness, I should mention that prior to my watching The Ring, my friend told me of a scene that he found particularly scary; thus, I was able to anticipate it. Nevertheless, that scene was the only part of the movie that was close to being truly frightening.)

In fact, I found parts of The Ring quite funny because Verbinski faithfully includes many of the elements common in the genre: the slow, close-up shot of the back of a victim's head (ever since Psycho, we know that when we turn the body around, the face is going to be a horrific mess); the unnervingly freaky and precocious child who has some connection with the nether world; and lots of cloudy/rainy weather.

Nevertheless, despite my disappointment, The Ring raised a couple of interesting metaphysical questions in my mind. First of all: Who, exactly, is this spirit girl? As in so many horror movies, it is unclear how the antagonist came to be and whether she answers to anybody. If she is merely a minion of Satan, then why does she appear to have so much autonomy and agency? The movie gives no explanation as to her genesis, implying that she merely arose ex nihilo; we know that she experienced an injustice in her past, but we do not know how she got the power to travel through time, space, and multimedia.

Second: Why the insatiable hunger for perpetual revenge? Why doesn't this spirit return to the nether world once the injustice has been rectified? Why does she insist on haunting even more bystanders? Perhaps she is the embodiment of a pure (Platonic?) narcissism, a being whose only raison d'etre is drawing the entire universe's attention to herself. (Perhaps she is not employed by Satan because she actually embodies Satan, whose greatest sin is selfish pride, a refusal to worship the truly sovereign God.)

On a less spiritual level, perhaps the girl represents the extreme, though logical, outcome of the political life, a life that often facilitates both narcissism and totalitarianism. (Politics, a realm of existence that relies on domination and control, easily falls prey to totalitarian impulses.) Perhaps Verbinski is taking a subtle swipe at politicians, holding up the girl spirit as the raw, unadorned face of the smiling candidate who looks not only to win our vote but eventually to control our lives through fear and violence. Perhaps Verbinski is suggesting that our voting unwittingly facilitates the horror of politics.

Yet, I digress. Unfortunately, The Ring does not give us enough information to satisfy the intellectual curiosity fomented in the minds of audience members. (As with my earlier discussion regarding zombies, I wanted more information about the metaphysical mechanics of The Ring's universe.) While Rachel's investigation, rather than the horror of her situation, is the more stimulating aspect of the movie, Verbinski nevertheless relies primarily on the overly emotive elements of the horror genre (i.e., freaking people out), a move that ultimately sells short The Ring's potential.