"That's not my ringtone..."
One Missed Call is a 2008 American remake of J-horror movie
Chakushin Ari. The main plot is that a spirit inside cell phones will call itself and play for the owner what they'll sound like when they die shortly after. This version stars Shannyn Sossamon and Edward Burns.
Tropes used by the movie:
- Black Chick Dies First: Poor Meagan Good.
- Cultural Translation
- Dark Secret: The killer ghost wasn't of the mother of the two girls, it was the older sister.
- Evil Phone
- For the Evulz: After its first few victims, the ghost really seems to have no reason to kill anybody besides plain old sociopathy.
- Genre Killer: This movie marked the end of the trend of J-horror remakes. Ironically, the movie made $27 million domestically, which is more than other Asian Horror remakes like Shutter ($26 mil), Dark Water ($25 mil), and Pulse ($20 mil). It made $46 million worldwide and cost $20 million to make, so there's a decent chance it turned a profit. Part of this was due to overexposure (this was one of four major American remakes of Asian horror films in 2008) and the rise of Paranormal Activity and its found-footage ilk as the new standard of mainstream horror the next year.
- Haunted Technology: the phone.
- Ironic Nursery Tune: The aforementioned ringtone-that-is-not-theirs.
- Orphanage of Fear
- The Call Knows Where You Live: Remove the battery from your phone? The call will still get through. Cancel your cell phone service and break the processor chips in your phone? It'll still ring.
- You Can't Fight Fate: You would think that trying to avoid saying the "last words" a victim hears would null the prophecy, but... actually, none of the characters thought of that. a Prophecy Twist is still possible, on special occasions.
1 reviews