Silk

...

...get your mind out of the gutter.

(The front of the DVD case on the right here claims that "The realism of WHITE NOISE with the sheer terror of THE EYE" is what you'll find in this movie. Realism being quack -scientific terms being thrown around in the hopes that no one knows what they're talking about, and sheer terror being a bizarre story line that leaves you wondering what the heck is going on between the living and the dead, with one creepy-ass little boy wandering around reenacting his death)

I just had the time and interest to view "Silk" otherwise known as "gui si," a 2006 Taiwanese horror about a team of scientists and a sniper ("Tung," pictured on the left in the poster below) hired by the government to work with them in studying a ghostly boy using a new protein in the form of the "Menger sponge," a structure that acts like a black hole sucking all manner of energy into it at a microscopic level, somehow allowing you to see ghosts when it is put into a liquid then sprayed into your eyes (apparently embedding itself permanently in there - can you say cataracts?)

(Chang Chen as Tung, Yosuke Eguchi as the bitter scientist Hashimoto)

The movie is well reviewed and summarized here - with more skill and effort than I could possibly muster in regards to this flick - but long story short, "Silk is one overstuffed film. It tries to be a ghost film, a supernatural thriller, a character drama, and even a pulse-pounding action flick, complete with a familar-sounding score from Peter Kam (Purple Storm, Tokyo Raiders). There's also some unexpected humor, and even some effective heartbreak involving Tung's relationship with his comatose mother. It's all a bit much, but Silk manages to string things together thanks to an involving storyline, well-developed tension, ace production values, and Chang Chen's charismatic central performance. Chang has always been an actor to watch, and Silk is worth seeing if only see this veteran of Wong Kar-Wai and Hou Hsiao-Hsien films stalk all over Taiwan shooting ghosts with Menger Sponge-enhanced bullets. Yeah, it all sounds a bit silly, but this is clearly a commercial film intended for international appeal, and it achieves its aims in an efficient and entertaining manner. It's not scary, nor is it really that conclusive, but hey, it's also not bad. (Kozo 2006)"

It's stuffed to the gills with completely bogus sounding pseudo-science and strange lighting, freaky-looking ghosts in the tradition of the Ring, Grudge and Eye, but if you're looking for a good time with a scary movie that's more thought than jump-tactics horror, have 108 minutes of spare time, and if you don't mind sub-titles, I think you'd enjoy seeing "Silk."

Here's a taste in the form of a partial English, partial sub-titled preview. (I apologize for the horrible sound quality, but this isn't my video)