Review of The Eye 2

The Eye 2 (2004)
6/10
wrong title, good film
3 December 2006
As has been said, this movie has virtually nothing to do with the original Eye, except for the blurry ghost effects and music video style direction/editing. Good thing too as I believe that movie was corny and hardly better than your average television show despite many other more favorable opinions of it on this site. My biggest complaint was the music-video style of this movie, too slick and cool to really make this movie scary or unnerving, Pang Brothers have good potential to make some effective horror but always resort to trendy camera-work, cheesy synthesizers and obvious "scary moment" sound and music that renders their work a bit shallow and more juvenile than it should be. Too bad because they have some good actors, high production values and some decent ideas that touch upon what could be really deeper themes and squander what could have been much more effective chills and thrills. I like the sad/angry/vengeful/pitiful ghost in this movie very much. What an interesting choice for an actress, scary and beautiful at the same time.

Another interesting point is the way in which Buddism has been overshadowed by Northen Chinese, Hindu and Tibetan style mysticism in so much of Asia now. Buddah;s original writings actually stressed that there is no soul that exists beyond the interconnected array of desires, fears and impulses that make up the living moment, there is no possibility of reincarnation as there is no essential soul or "self" to speak of. His teachings directly opposed the Hindu pantheon of gods and Tibetan shamanistic mythologies that were prevalent in his time and have become to intertwined with contemporary Asian-Buddist culture and national identity. His message of enlightenment was specifically to do away with the forms of belief that dealt with concepts like spirits and reincarnation and find the unburdened, unencumbered awareness of the present "now". This very major point has been lost in the Chinese dominated parts of most Asia at this point and Buddism has become a very superstitious belief system rather than an approach to a liberated psychology. Sri Lanka has become the modern heart of the faithful Buddist teaching, read " The Gods drink whiskey" if you are interested.
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