As Kayako closes in, Karen sees the gasoline and ignites it. Kayako crawls down the stairs and latches onto Doug, who dies of shock. She finds Doug paralyzed and attempts to flee with him. After learning that Doug has ventured to the Saeki house to look for her, Karen races there. That night, Nakagawa carries gasoline into the house in an attempt to burn it down, but is killed by Takeo. Karen researches the house, eventually confronting Nakagawa, who explains that three of his colleagues investigating the Saeki deaths were all consumed by the curse. Kayako begins haunting Karen, who informs her boyfriend Doug of the situation. While leaving work, Alex is killed by Yoko's jawless corpse. At home, Kayako attacks her and she vanishes. Meanwhile, Matt's sister, Susan, is pursued by Kayako around her office building. In the attic, Nakagawa and his partner Igarashi find Matt and Jennifer's bodies, along with a human's lower jaw. Alex calls the police, with the presence of Detective Nakagawa. At the house, Karen discovers Toshio sealed up in a wardrobe and later on witnesses Kayako's spirit descending from the ceilings to claim Emma.Īlex arrives at the house shortly after and finds Emma dead and Karen in a state of shock.
Yoko, a care worker, arrives at the house to find Emma alone before she encounters Kayako, who drags her up into the attic.Ĭoncerned about Yoko's disappearance, her employer Alex sends another care worker, Karen Davis, to take over the care of Emma. Matt and Jennifer are quickly consumed by the curse. While Matt is thrilled with the house, his wife Jennifer and dementia-ridden mother Emma feel uncomfortable.
In 2004, the Williams family from America move into the Saeki house. The remainder of the Saeki family rise again as ghosts due to the curse, notably Kayako, who appears as an onryō. Shocked, he flees the scene and commits suicide the next day. After Takeo hides the bodies in the house, Kayako's ghost hangs him.Īfter receiving a letter from Kayako, Peter visits the Saeki house only to find both her and Takeo's corpses along with Toshio's ghost. Takeo brutally murders her, their young son Toshio, and the pet cat Mar in a fit of rage. Her husband Takeo becomes jealous as he discovers the diary and believes that Kayako is having an affair with another man. In 2001, Kayako Saeki, a housewife living in suburban Tokyo, is in love with college professor Peter Kirk, obsessively writing about him in a diary. The following events are explained in their actual order, however, the film is presented in a nonlinear narrative. Those who encounter the curse die, and the curse is reborn repeatedly, passing from victim to victim in an endless, growing chain of horror. The Grudge describes a curse that is born when someone dies in the grip of extreme rage or sorrow, created where the person died. A remake, also entitled The Grudge (2020), takes place concurrently with the events of this film and its two sequels.
The film was followed by two sequels, theatrically-released The Grudge 2 (2006) and straight-to-video The Grudge 3 (2009). In its opening weekend, the film grossed $39 million, becoming the first horror film since House on Haunted Hill (1999) to top the Halloween box office and, until the Friday the 13th remake in 2009, had the highest grossing opening weekend for a horror remake. The film grossed $187 million against a $10 million budget and received mixed reviews from critics, who found it illogical and barely scary. The Grudge was released in North America on October 22, 2004, by Columbia Pictures. Principal photography on the film began on Januand wrapped in July 2004 in Tokyo, Japan. Shimizu, the writer and director of the original film, was hired to direct the film, from a screenplay written by Susco. The plot is told through a nonlinear sequence of events, and includes several intersecting subplots.Īfter the success of American remake The Ring (2002), Sony Pictures had green-lit an American remake of Ju-On: The Grudge. Takako Fuji, Yuya Ozeki, and Takashi Matsuyama portray the characters Kayako Saeki, Toshio Saeki, and Takeo Saeki from the original films.
THE GRUDGE MOVIE TRAILER SERIES
A remake of Shimizu's 2002 Japanese horror film Ju-On: The Grudge, it stars Sarah Michelle Gellar, Jason Behr, KaDee Strickland, Clea DuVall, and Bill Pullman, and is the first installment in The Grudge film series which is based on the Japanese Ju-On films. The Grudge is a 2004 supernatural horror film directed by Takashi Shimizu, written by Stephen Susco, and produced by Sam Raimi, Robert Tapert, and Takashige Ichise.