About halfway through the movie, I was actually considering giving this a 4, but the complete and utter lack of reasoning in this movie that made me give it a 1 I will now try to sum up.
The ghost made a website that people can log (and start hallucinating from) onto only 48 hours later they will be dead unless they find her body so she can exact revenge on someone who killed her on another website that people subscribe to, even though she kills other people in car crashes and train accidents who had no involvement with her death.
Things I learned from FearDotCom:
-Ghosts are capable of creating websites.
-The internet is inherently evil.
-People who use the internet are freaks.
-People who use the internet are incapable of closing their eyes.
-A bunch of weird images on a computer can drive someone crazy and make them hallucinate.
-A bunch of weird images on a movie can drive someone so crazy that they hallucinate so they think what they are watching makes one ounce of logical sense.
Obviously the producers of this movie wanted the audience to be driven insane by the film and have shut off our brains by the time the "ending" has arrived. Sadly, I was still conscious at the end which didn't explain anything and only dropped my score from a 4 to a 1.
And it's a very boring movie too. Did I mention this movie sucks?
Plot summary
When four bodies are discovered among the industrial decay and urban grime of New York City, brash young detective Mike Reilly teams with ambitious Department of Health researcher Terry Huston to uncover the cause behind their violent and inexplicable deaths. The only common factor shared by the victims? Each died exactly 48 hours after logging onto a website called feardotcom.
September 20, 2023 at 04:39 PM
Tech specs
720p.WEBMovie Reviews
Incomprehensible
It's a mess.
I was interested to see if time had been kind to this film, or if the original loathing I felt during the release still held. Well the answer, it's worse then I remember, time has of course been unkind, so it now looks dated, but worse, it's an incoherent mess, that makes absolutely no sense. I will give some credit to Natasha McElhone, who does at least try and give a sincere performance, but she was up against it in this dire film.
At the time the production values were pretty good, so I won't slate it for ageing, but I will slam it for being a terrible film, that makes no sense at all, it never decides whether it wants to be a thriller or a supernatural horror.
Avoid. 2/10
The 'Ringu' of Internet A Ghost Story
After some mysterious deaths showing the same symptoms in the victims, Terry Huston (Natascha McElhone), from the Department of Health, investigates the possibility of a virus in the city with Homicide Detective Mike Reilly (Stephen Dorff). However, they realize that all the victims have visited an Internet site called 'www.fear.com' forty-eight hours before dying. A further investigation shows that there is a ghost on the web killing its users. Meanwhile, Detective Mike Reilly is also investigating a murderer called Alistair Pratt, 'The Doctor' (Stephen Rea). This movie has good and bad points. The story is plagiarized from the excellent and original Japanese 'Ringu', but the American 'The Ring' was a copy and became a success. There are some flaws along the confused plot. But there are also interesting points. For example, the dark and rainy atmosphere recalls 'Seven'. There is a sort of contrast between the modern (computer, Internet, cars) and life in the 30's or 40's (old buildings, classic costumes and furniture), recalling a film-noir, with a beautiful photography and style. There are also some reasonable special effects. The cast is slightly above average, with Natascha McElhone, Stephen Rea and Stephen Dorff. Therefore I dare to say that it is a watchable movie and I do not agree with the User Rating. My vote is six.
Title (Brazil): 'MedoPontoCombr' ('FearDotCom')