Actors: Anthony Chan, Richard Ng, Chin Siu-Ho, Kara Wai, Nina Paw
Directors: Juno Mak
Rated: Unrated
Studio: Well Go USA
Release Date: July 8, 2014
Run Time: 105 minutes
Film: 3 out of 5 stars
Extras: 1/2 out of 5 stars
I love J-horror or Japanese horror films…or at least I think I do. The last few I have watched haven’t been bad but freaking terrible including “Tormented”, “Sadako” etc. “Rigor Mortis” has a really cool poster so it won me over (and I don’t mean this cover art for the Blu-ray, that is a failure). So with this film, I obviously went in with a bad attitude but I was pleasantly surprised. The story had its moments were it was awesome and at the same time super confusing. The visual effects also range from great to absolutely terrible. Either way this was a big improvement over the last few and worth checking out.
Official Premise: In this eerie and chilling, contemporary, action/special effects laden homage to the classic Chinese vampire movies of the 1980 s, writer-director-producer, Juno Mak makes his feature directorial debut. Co-produced by J-Horror icon Takashi Shimizu, and reuniting some of the original cast members of the classic Mr. Vampire series, RIGOR MORTIS is set in a creepy and moody Hong Kong public housing tower whose occupants we soon discover, run the gamut from the living to the dead, to the undead, along with ghosts, vampires and zombies.
I don’t know what is going on with horror recently but they just isn’t scary anymore. Films like “Ju-on” and “The Ring” are scary, this isn’t scary at all. This was even co-produced by Takashi Shimizu, who directed “Ju-on”, but even he has fallen far his J-horror seat. The 1080p transfer looks good and works with the visual effects. The DTS-HD Master Audio track sounds good enough with the eerie score, I just left that it missed the mark with the scares. Lastly there are no special features included besides a trailer.
