'Dark Water' probes depths, proves shallow

There is no blood, no killing and scarcely any violence, yet this does little to undermine Dark Water's status as a horror film. Japanese filmmaker Hideo Nakata makes good use of images of water, changing it from a positive sign of life and prosperity, to a creepy, noisome metaphor.

The tap water contains tufts of black hair. Water drips from the ceiling to the floor, flows from a rooftop holding tank and floods the room. A dark secret emerges from the deluge and brings misfortune to those near it.

Dark Water is yet another pairing of Nakata and Koji Suzuki, the famous Japanese horror author and also writer of the Ring series. Compared with Ring (1998), Dark Water is simpler and more concentrated. But unlike Ring, where the horror built like a domino effect, Dark Water haunts.

Yoshimi is a recently divorced woman who moves with her 6-year-old daughter Ikuku to a new apartment built on land reclaimed from the sea. It is a chilly, empty building where most of the apartments remain unrented. Yoshimi and Ikuku discover they have few neighbors and an old doorman.

A leak in the ceiling is the first omen. Water keeps dripping from the ceiling, adding more trouble to an already disturbed Yoshimi. Having previously worked as a proofreader at a publishing house, she began suffering from panic attacks in fear of the extreme violence she read about in horror stories every day. She is in the midst of a custody battle with her ex husband and is forced to take another job proofreading. Meanwhile, a series of creepy events take place.

A red schoolbag keeps appearing in different places throughout her apartment, despite Yoshimi throwing it in the garbage bin. It shows up by the water tower on the rooftop. It's found at the doorman's nook and then appears in Ikuku's room inside the little girl's own schoolbag. The image of a young girl begins cutting into the storyline. Her face is blurred and covered by long hair. She wears a yellow raincoat, standing in front of a kindergarten waiting in the rain for her mother to pick her up. Then Ikuku falls ill at her kindergarten, her whole body soaked in water.

To this point, the film's plotline is confused. Yoshimi tries attributing all these events to pranks played by Ikuku's father preying on her weak mind in order to regain custody of Ikuku. Or could it all be in Yoshimi's mind? During her childhood she suffered from an intense fear of abandonment by her mother.

Frustrated and afraid as she is, Yoshimi musters enough pluck to climb up the water tower and see what's inside. This is the most luring part of horror films -- though it is human nature to simply scream and run away, we are also compelled to go step by step towards the things that scare us in order to unravel their mystery. In this way, Dark Water is an exercise in cruel exploitation.

The film is effectively a solo performance for actress Hitomi Kuroki as she vividly portrays the loving mother with weak nerves. Add Nakata's compelling narrative to the mix and you have a watchable film.

The weakest part of Dark Water, however, is its ending. The climax of the horror -- when the ghost actually appears -- is too simple and thin. Then time swiftly jumps 10 years, when Ikuku is a high school student returning to the house that haunted her. An opportunity to scare the audience one last time is spoiled in order to satisfy the film's emotional narrative. Pity that it fails at this, too.