But not obvious blood-and-guts horror. We're speaking of films that fall more under the heading of creepy afterlife spookers. In fact, the plots of some Asian horror pics over the last two or three years suggest that the Orient has become the optimum place in the motion picture realm to "see dead people," to use an overworked expression.

The bottom line is that over the last few months various Hollywood producers have snapped up remake rights to several Asian-produced, audience-friendly genre films -- horror pics, mainly -- in an attempt to replicate THE RING's phenomenal success.

Directed by Gore Verbinski and released last October 18th, this upscale fright flick about a killer videotape brought in huge piles of cash, re-energized Verbinski's career (which had been looking a tiny bit enervated in the wake of THE MEXICAN), and is still paying off with healthy revenues from the recently released DVD and videotape.

Along with Japanimation, Asian action flicks (i.e., primarily those from Hong Kong and Japan) have enjoyed cult popularity among Hollywood filmmakers since at least the early '90s. This has resulted over the last decade in the flourishing of John Woo's career, the popularity of Ang Lee's CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON and THE MATRIX, the hiring of "wire guys" for acrobatic fight sequences, Quentin Tarantino's Japanese-influenced KILL BILL, and so on.

But in the wake of THE RING, Asian horror flicks are now being looked at by Hollywood as the Next Cool Thing to fleece.

I don't know if this is resulting in U.S.-based opportunities for the original Asian alchemists (it may be in one instance), but here's a list of some of the Asian spookers Hollywood types have either purchased or optioned the remake rights to:

* THE EYE, a 2002 Thailand horror film from the Pang Brothers (Oxide and Danny) that Palm Pictures is releasing on June 6th, was bought last summer for possible remaking by Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner's C/W Prods. Originally known as JIAN GUI, it's about a blind girl who gets a cornea transplant in order to see again, but this new vision unfortunately allows her to also see ghosts, some of whom are rather unfriendly and terrifying.

* PULSE, an '01 Japanese horror film by the widely-respected Kiyoshi Kurosawa, is being remade by Wes Craven for Miramax films, with a script by Craven and Vince Gilligan, based on Kurosawa's original, which was called KAIRO. It was shown at Cannes two years ago as part of the "Un Certain Regard" section. The story's about some ghostly visions appearing to a group of young friends after one of their chums commits suicide. One friend sees his dead bro lurking in the shadows, while another's computer keeps showing strange, spooky images.

* THE GRUDGE, a Japanese horror film by Pakashi Shimizu (released in Japan as JU-ON in '00), has not only been acquired for limited theatrical and video release by Lion's Gate Entertainment, but is also being developed by Sam Raimi and Rob Tapert's recently formed company Ghost House Pictures (in alliance with Senator International) for an American remake. In an unusual move, Raimi and Tapert want Shimuzu (who is only in his late 20s) to direct, instead of bringing in another Gore Verbinski type.

* THE CURE, a '97 Kurosawa horror flick originally known as KYUA, is being developed by United Artists. The original was about a wave of gruesome murders plaguing Tokyo, with the only connection being a bloody "X" carved into the neck of each of the victims. In each case the murderer is found near the victim but remembers nothing of the crime. A cop and a shrink can't make heads or tails of the whole mess until they arrest a young oddball type who "has a strange effect on everyone who comes into contact with him" (according to one synopsis) and may be a link between the killings.

* DARK WATER, an '02 horror flick from RINGU creator Hideo Nakata, is being developed for a possible U.S. remake by Pandemonium, the production company run by former 20th Century Fox honcho Bill Mechanic. The IMDB describes the plot of the Japanese original as being about "a mother and her six year old daughter [moving] into a creepy apartment" only to discover "water dripping from the ceiling." (Aaaah...dripping water!) The original Japanese film was written by RINGU author Kôji Suzuki. Rafael Iglesias (FROM HELL) is currently writing the Pandemonium version. .

* CHAOS, another Nakata film, was said to have aroused the initial interest of British director Jonathan Glazer (SEXY BEAST), although I'm told he's now cooled on the idea of doing an English-language remake. The project is apparently alive and moving along, though, with producer Laura Bickford (TRAFFIC) holding the reins. Released in '99 under the original title of KAOSU, it's about a guy who gets caught up in a kidnapping scheme with the wife of a wealthy businessman, only to find the victim dead in the hide-out location. He buries her body and tries to return to his day-to-day life...but of course, her corpse (spirit?) returns. Half-thriller, half-horror.

* DON'T LOOK UP, a third Nakata flick, is being offered as a remake project by a South African company called Distant Horizon. Originally released in '96 as JOYUU-REI. I couldn't locate a synopsis, but the IMDB mentions an alternate title -- GHOST ACTRESS -- that indicates another dead-walking-the-earth storyline.

There's also a Hong Kong-produced policier called INFERNAL AFFAIRS that producer Brad Grey and his client Brad Pitt have paid $2 million for the remake rights to. Released last year under the title WU JIAN DAO and directed by Wai Keung Lau and Siu Fai Mak, it was shown last week at the San Francisco Film Festival. I saw it and I'm frankly not a fan, but others I talked to said they loved it.

It's about a mole inside the police force...or is he/she inside a criminal organization? Grey and Pitt had better hire an extra-good writer to Americanize it, because the Hong Kong version felt kind of dry and pointless to me.

How and why have Asian horror directors suddenly stepped into the forefront?

"These guys are mostly genre directors," says Palm Pictures Ryan Werner, "but they're definitely bringing a fresh take to the table. A few years ago [the Asian scene] was all about these Hong Kong action directors, and about artists like Wong Kar Wai. But then the success of THE RING just woke everybody up and drove the point home."

Mechanic stresses that his company picked up DARK WATER in '01, well before the success of THE RING, and "that there was no trend or anything that motivated us other than the fact that this movie was very good in its original incarnation and seemed very adaptable to this market, and because nobody had really seen it." He adds that "if it were offered to us today we probably wouldn't be interested, because there's so much else going on. The worst thing Hollywood does is follow trends. The worst thing is to be doing what everyone else is doing."

Man of Letters

I wasn't permitted to attend the first big Hollywood screening of THE MATRIX RELOADED last night on the Warner Bros. lot (My time will be next Thursday). I could have gotten some reactions from two or three friends who went, but this Ain't It Cool review from Neil Cumpston is such a kick to read, I thought I'd run some excerpts. Not because Neil's necessarily the best educated tool in the shed, but because he can really write. Read this and tell me I'm wrong:

"Jim-Jammity Jesus Krispy Kreme Christ on a twat-rocket, this movie blew me apart and put me back together only after I'd got put back I felt like I had thirteen dicks and they'd all gotten blown by a surfer chick with 26 heads (2 mouths on each cock). I will see MATRIX RELOADED ten times and if I see STAR WARS George or that gay BATMAN director butt-hole any time during the ten screenings here comes Mr. Punch.

"This is the sequel to the MATRIX movie that came out four years ago, and after seeing it I can say I could have waited another four years -- it is that fucking good. This movie is a pillowcase with soda cans inside that beats the living mule-fuck out of you but you're all like, 'Bring it on, honky tonk' because the beating feels like summer and Halloween and Cheetos at the same time. This movie is Mad Max's shotgun-gun from ROAD WARRIOR, only it shoots ass-kicking only at jocks. This movie is tits!

"Here's the thing: you could wear headphones and listen to Dio during this whole movie and you wouldn't miss anything, there's so much ass-kicking going on. That Smith Dude is back, only now he can make more Smith Dudes and do they each know how to kick ass? Like a Heroclix collector knows how to not get pussy. Plus he's got this other ability that's really fucking scary and I think it might have something to do with the next movie.

"Stay through the credits and you get to see a trailer for MATRIX: YOU WILL SHIT, the third movie. That's it -- best movie of the year. I still want to see HULK-MAN and the werewolf thing and I think there's something where you get to see a hot Asian's boobs, but they're not going to get close to this one. Here's my blurb if they're putting blurbs in ads: 'MATRIX: KINGDOM OF ASS-KICKING is like if all of Anthrax's albums formed into a hot chick who had to fuck you ten times a day or she gets pee-cancer."

We Are All Sheep

Before completely leaving behind the San Francisco Film Festival, I have one last tribute to pay. It's about a four-hour, BBC-produced documentary by Adam Curtis called THE CENTURY OF THE SELF, which aired last year at this time in England, but has yet to be seen on these shores. I have no qualms in calling it perhaps the most intriguing, audacious, brilliantly insightful study of publicity, mass psychology and Orwellian mind control ever put together.

THE CENTURY OF THE SELF tells the pretty much untold (in this particular form, at least) and appalling story of the growth of the mass-consumer societies in Britain and the United States. How was the all-consuming self created, by whom, and in whose interests? In a way, SELF explains with creepy clarity why some in the Middle East regard U.S. consumer culture as delusional and poisoned. See it and you'll start to understand a little bit better why some of the nutters over there are so bent out of shape.

Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, and his nephew Edward Bernays, the father of modern public relations and the very concept of "spin," are the genteel ogres at the heart of Curtis's social history. THE CENTURY OF THE SELF is really the story of Bernays' amazing influence, beginning in the 1920s, upon the techniques of selling and mass persuasion.

Curtis's film says in essence that Freud's uncovering of the drives within the human mind -- and particularly the influence of our subconscious urges -- has changed the world by way of Bernay's seminal revolution in public relations techniques, the results of which are everywhere today, and especially in big-time politics.

Before Bernays, advertising and political promotion was essentially about laying facts before the public and leaving them to decide to buy or not buy based on rational evaluation. Bernays' big idea was getting industry to start pitching products and services to people's unconscious -- to pull them in based on what they emotionally wanted, but didn't necessarily need.

An explanation on a BBC website puts it well: "By introducing a technique to probe the unconscious mind, Freud provided useful tools for understanding the secret desires of the masses. Unwittingly, however, his work served as the precursor to a world full of political spin doctors, marketing moguls, and society's belief that the pursuit of satisfaction and happiness is man's ultimate goal."

Telluride Film Festival director Tom Luddy implored me to see SELF during a conversation last week at the Kabuki, and so I borrowed all four tapes from the festival publicity office and sat myself down in a bottom-level projection booth to do just that. I was floored. Luddy told me later on the phone that journalist/author Christopher Hitchens is a big fan of the film, and so is Orville Schell, Dean of Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism.

Schell, said Luddy, had thought one way for THE CENTURY OF THE SELF to be seen in this country would be for PBS's "Frontline" series to air it. A call or two suggested otherwise. Brilliant and on-target as we believe Curtis's documentary to be, it may not be "balanced" enough.

SELF says in essence that we live in a country run by leaders who have never trusted the voters and have always sought (successfully, in most ways) to "control" our thinking and appetites and political allegiances. Such a declaration would almost certainly ignite controversy. A show like 'Frontline,' says Luddy, would "have to have two sides...they'd have to have this quote-unquote 'objectivity'...and this film is a polemic...it suggests that our democracy is manipulated by people who believe the voting public is fundamentally irrational."

Schell, who describes Luddy as a kind of "Johnny Appleseed" of new, see-worthy films, agrees that THE CENTURY OF THE SELF "is a natural to be aired someplace because it's a very good film. But I don't know that it's a natural for 'Frontline.' I don't think that show lends itself well enough to this kind of mission statement. But I think it's an amazing project, and precisely the kind of thing American TV should be providing.

However, says Schell, "If a film such as this were to appear on a network, I think I'd have a heart attack. The tragedy is that it's so unimaginable that a film such as this could be shown, much less made, by any of the apparatus that has come to be known as American TV."

I called Curtis in London and asked what has been perceived by some as a lack of balance in his film. He said that the mode of presenting differing points of view about a controversial subject is obviously a venerated approach, but it's now old hat.

"Those days of journalism are over," he said. "That was the sort of journalism that was formed during the Cold War. Our job is to actually tell a story, but it's not a polemic - it's a particular story told from a particular viewpoint.

"In the old days everyone knew what was happening on the world political stage ...there was a big struggle, that was it. Now there isn't an agreed-upon story, an agreed-upon position to be adopted. Christopher Hitchens has said that the job of modern journalism is to make sense of all these fragments that you can argue for or against."

There's a whole rundown -- photos, chapter breakdowns, links-- about the series on the BBC site (http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features) that will fill in some of the gaps. This doc really deserves to get out there and be seen, if not on the tube then at least on DVD.

Cumpston Chopped!

"You wrote, 'Not because Neil's necessarily the best educated tool in the shed, but because he can really write. Read this and tell me I'm wrong.' You're wrong." -- Chris Andrien

"Interesting review of THE MATRIX RELOADED but it sounds awfully close to some of the gushing that AICN did for ATTACK OF THE CLONES. While there's no doubt that RELOADED will be wall-to-wall, cutting-edge action, there is no mention in the review of whether it will be anything more than that.

"I thought the original MATRIX had some interesting ideas, but they kind of went out the window for the extreme-action climax. I've always been bothered by the slaughter of all those copper-top security guards. As Randal observed in CLERKS when referring to the destruction of the Death Star at the end of RETURN OF THE JEDI, these guys weren't evil agents like Smith -- they were just doing their job. And Neo killed them by the carload. I'm afraid that RELOADED may turn out to be more of the same.

"I trust that your critical sensibilities won't be overwhelmed by a bunch of gee-whiz gimcrackery (though I think most guys would be overwhelmed by fellatio from a cheerleader with two mouths). Let us know your take as soon as you see it." -- Rich Swank

"If you thought Neil Cumpston's MATRIX review was a hoot, check out his X2 and BLADE 2 reviews. Pure hilarity." -- Scott Senay

"At least there's an upside to not going to the advanced advanced screening: You didn't have to sit beside Cumpston for the whole thing. To me, that review was written like he was a crack addict who is told by his dealer to review the film before he can get another rock. Still looking forward to it. Is Dio on the soundtrack? Just kidding." -- Alex Stanford, Ottawa, Canada.

Mighty Relief

"I have a gripe about your complaint about A MIGHTY WIND, which was that Guest and Levy should be try to angle their next filmmore toward the experience of GenX or GenY. Spare me from movies about/for the younger-skewing crowds!!! If what we have been seeing all year are examples of what that age range is wanting (or thinks they want), there are going to be a lot more people like me who are sitting home watching television or the computer.

"Given this, it was an absolute breath of fresh air to see A MIGHTY WIND and encounter some well-rounded, interesting, non-shallow, fairly introspective people who had something of interest to say and do. I felt that I came out of that movie having been invited over to an emotionally rich feast, unlike indulging in the empty calorie garbage that has been foisted on us. One of the conclusions that I have to draw from this is that unlike the 20-somethings, the baby boomers are actually still in the creativity business." -- Arian Sarris (no relation to Andrew).

Wells to Sarris: Your'e right and I agree for the most part, but I still wouldn't mind it if Guest-Levy were to sashay in the oppposite direction next time of that boomer-esque, getting-older, edge-of-retirement sensibility that seems to be affecting their stories and characters more and more. All the good stuff you're enjoying could and should remain -- I'm just talking about the generational focus and the wallpaper.

Last Word