A horror movie about the perils of viral photo-sharing, ‘Viral’ is an unexpectedly underwhelming and mildly scary Thai horror experience.
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Given the ubiquity of mobile phones, it’s only before time before we start to see mobile phone being major plot devices in horror films. In Thai director Manussanan Pongsuwan’s newest horror film ‘Viral’, 19-year-old Tang (Ploy Sornnarin) finds herself wandering into an abandoned and dilapidated house to play a virtual ghost-catching mobile game. Instead, she comes into contact with a real ghost and snaps a picture of it. Tang sends the picture to her friends, Title (Ong Thana) and Kitty (Ja Sutida), who forwards it to her boyfriend Wit (Best Nattasit). Pretty soon, those who have received the picture start to see the ghost.
The idea of the haunted mobile photo is a decent premise to build a horror movie on. ‘The Ring’ is also somewhat based on this premise, except that it was through an old-fashioned videotape. The scary thing about a digital picture is that it can be spread around at a much faster rate. Unfortunately, this is something that ‘Viral’ does not take advantage of. So despite the modern technology, it’s still a pretty traditional horror film.
Even so, the scares are very underwhelming. In ‘The Ring’, the haunted videotape and the TV screen enabled the filmmakers to create a whole new horror experience: Sadako crawling through the TV screen to ensnare her victims. There is nothing of this sort in ‘Viral’. What there are, are a lot of false scares and atmospheric build-ups that end without payoff. This is because, as viewers will find out why by the end of the film, the ghost doesn’t actually harm anyone. She pops in and out without doing anything much, and it seems as if the director expects that her heavy makeup to be, in and of itself, frightening.
In the director’s note, Pongsuwan has said that she was inspired by the youths she observed while on set. A lot of them are addicted to their mobile screens and can’t imagine life without them. But the actual movie does not seem to present a meaningful exploration of today’s rampant screen culture. If you did not read the director’s note, you’d wonder what it is the movie is trying to say.
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