Dark Water Poster

Dark Water (2002)

Drama | Mystery 
Rayting:   6.7/10 30.3K votes
Country: Japan
Language: Japanese
Release date: 19 January 2002

A mother and her 6 year old daughter move into a creepy apartment whose every surface is permeated by water.

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claudio_carvalho 6 November 2005

The reviser Yoshimi Matsubara (Hitomi Kuroki) has just divorced from her husband and is disputing the custody of their five years old daughter Ikuko Matsubara (Rio Kano) in the justice. She is looking for an apartment and a job to restart her life alone with Ikuko. She finds a small old apartment, and she does not pay attention to a stain of water on the ceiling. When she moves to the apartment, she notes that there is a drip of water in the bedroom, and she asks the landlord to repair the leakage. Meanwhile, Ikuko finds a red bag on the terrace, and Yoshimi returns it to the administrator. Yoshimi sees the creepy shape of a girl wearing a yellow coat, and she finds that she resembles a young girl that has been missing for two years in the neighborhood. She becomes afraid that the girl might be a ghost.

"Honogurai Mizu no Soko Kara" is a tense low-paced horror movie, with a frightening and original story. The characters and the situation are slowly developed, the climax is scary, but I did not like the conclusion. I was really a little disappointed, since I expected much more. However, this film is another great Japanese horror movie, the best producers of this genre in the present days. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Dark Water – Água Negra" ("Dark Water – Black Water")

ferbs54 2 April 2008

Fmovies: Director Hideo Nakata's 1998 offering, "Ringu," based on a book by the so-called "Stephen King of Japan," Koji Suzuki, was one of the scariest movies I've seen in years. Thus, it was with great expectation that I popped the same team's 2002 effort, "Dark Water," into my DVD player at home. And while this latter film may not be the horror masterpiece that "Ringu" is, it still has much to offer. The story here concerns a newly divorced mother, Yoshimi Matsubara (sympathetically portrayed by Hitomi Kuroki), who moves into a run-down apartment building with her 5-year-old daughter, Ikuko, while at the same time starting a new job and engaging in a custody battle. We really come to care about the plight of these two characters, especially when some decidedly creepy incidents in the building start to pile up, and this gradually escalating sense of there being something "wrong" with the building turns out to be fully justified. Whereas "Ringu" provided us with that truly terrifying TV crawl-through scene, "Dark Water" offers a scene that is also absolutely guaranteed to raise the hackles on the back of any viewer's neck (I'm thinking here of the one in the elevator near the end, natch). Similar again to "Ringu," a water container turns out to be the site of a childhood tragedy, and a lank-haired ghost girl makes for one very creepy presence. Special kudos must be given here to young Rio Kanno, in her role as Ikuko. Kanno is just remarkable, and surely one of the most adorable kids I've ever seen on film. I'd give her a 9.8 on the Cute-O-Meter. With an involving story, excellent acting, some genuine chills and that great novelist/director pedigree mentioned above, "Dark Water" is a fine example of "J-horror" indeed, and if nothing else underlines the importance of having a really good building super!

HumanoidOfFlesh 8 December 2003

Hideo Nakata's "Dark Water" is one of the creepiest Japanese horror movies I have ever seen.A nervous mother Yoshimi Matsubara,undergoing divorce proceedings,moves into an apartment building that is haunted by a young girl,who disappeared years earlier."Dark Water" is a perfect horror film.It is based on a novel by Koji Suzuki,so fans of "Ringu" won't be disappointed.Nakata's technique is to imply terror by suggestion,rather than the overuse of special effects.He perfectly captures an atmosphere of uncontrollable fear.Hitomi Kuroki is excellent as the neurotic,paranoid Yoshimi and Rio Kanno is equally remarkable as her five year old daughter,Ikuko.So if you're a fan of Japanese horror give this one a look.10 out of 10.Highly recommended.

Atavisten 26 May 2005

Dark Water fmovies. The silence the newly divorced mother and her 6 year old daughter experience in an apartment block they have just moved into sets the mood here. We see how they are together realistically, that means lots of silence and little action. One aspect that makes this scary is this realistic depiction of isolation you can get in these houses. And you cant help but wish the best for the two, struggling with work, the divorce rights and beginning school. And it rains.

Water starts dripping from the ceiling and soon it permeates the whole building creating an uneasy and nervous mood that sneaks in on you and when you're not ready for it makes your nerves scream. You know its gonna happen and you get a good idea of where its leading, but its so well made that it doesn't matter.

bob the moo 18 June 2003

In the middle of a difficult custody battle over her 6 year old daughter with her ex husband, Yoshimi Matsubara takes a flat in an old building in order to get some stability in their lives. However the problems start with a constant and spreading leak in the ceiling of their flat and the sense of someone else being around the building. Yoshimi becomes increasingly on edge when Ikuko appears to be effected.

Setting out my stall from the start I really liked Ringu and was happy to see this film from the same director. I knew nothing about it when I sat in the cinema and I think that is the best way to see it (although my plot synopsis about will have spoilt nothing). Dark Water continues Nakata's ability of unsettling audiences with little devices. Here he stays with the child theme from Ringu and it works very well despite being a much simpler plot that isn't anywhere near as clever as the other film. However in terms of delivering scares Nakata builds with shadowy images and creeping effects – the spread of the leak across the ceiling is creepy and the reoccurring image of a child's pink bag becomes increasingly unnerving as the film progresses.

The direction is strong throughout with the camera preferring to turn to see what the characters see rather than having something leap into view or simply be cut to – this turning movement can take seconds where our tension is build by being kept waiting. Again the use of shadowy figures and fleeting glimpses of things is very creepy and it really worked for me much better than all the gore in the world. It is a little ironic that one of the biggest jumps from the audience came from the film's one use of CGI effects, but this worked well simply due to the build up of suspense all the way through.

To compliment this the film uses music and sound very well. On the odd occasional it does the tradition thing where the music builds to up the tension, this works but is not unusual. What works better is the use of music WHEN the creeps arrive! Whenever Yoshimi looks at the leak the music gives it an unnerving quality that may not have existed with the shot alone. The simple plot makes for an effective little ghost story – there is an element of mystery here but it is more about the suspense than the history. This is OK but the ending is a little more predictable than I would have liked (at first glance) and the epilogue didn't really work for me and I felt it needed a stronger close (not necessarily a jump though). I say `at first glance' because it appears predictable but really it changes where I thought the film was going and the whole basis for the creepy scenes – ie I had assumed that the girl was taking Ikuko for play etc – I'll say no more but you'll understand when you see it.

The cast were good. My friend said that Kuroki's Yoshimi was so sappy she wanted to slap her but I actually thought she played it well. She convinced me she was a woman going through an emotionally challenging time and was being pushed. There was an element of her overplaying (maybe? It could be taken as realism) the fear in order to heighten the audience's but really this was benefical to the film as a whole. Kanno's Ikuko is excellent – I can't imagine a child I know being able to cope with that sort of filming but she does it very well and is a million miles from the annoying brats that Western films seem to dig up when required. These two are excellent and have reasonable support characters but the real star i

Rich B 10 February 2003

A story very similar in certain areas to another story by Hideo Nakata, but different enough to stand apart. Using similar techniques to the Ring series, Nakata employs askew camera angles, wide shots and the mixing of foreground and background, showing normality in one and abnormality in the other, often with the horrors in the background, unnoticed by the foreground characters. The use of audio, and indeed lack of in parts, heightens the tension and the feeling of unease even more. Throughout the film a nervousness grows, beginning with a slight niggle of something wrong, building to the final shocking realisations. Despite understanding the story before the end is reached, Nakato manages to pull you on through the story, in fact, even past where other films would have ended. Acting from the child is stunningly good, as is with the mother, with much of the story played out in the emotions of their faces rather than their actual words. This is perhaps what succeeds so well, the realism of the dialogue and the slow brooding story, with a distinct lack of action. Something Hollywood attempts to recreate in their unoriginal remakes.

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