Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

Creepy Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov November 16, 2017

Kiyoshi Kurosawa's "Creepy" (2016) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors Eureka Entertainment. The supplemental features on the disc include an original trailer for the film and filmed video interview with Kiyoshi Kurosawa. In Japanese, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-B "locked".

Detective Takakura

In the short prologue detective Takakura (Hidetoshi Nishijima) attempts to convince a violent thug to surrender himself after he takes hostage a young woman during a botched attempt to escape from a busy police department. The thug is surrounded by a group of armed cops just moments before he is about to exit the building and in a front of an even larger crowd of bystanders Takakura begins talking to him. He is convinced that he is doing all the right things to earn the thug’s trust and then quickly resolve the situation, but makes a crucial mistake.

The action picks up a few months later after Takakura has accepted a teaching position at a prestigious university in a quiet provincial town. His beautiful wife, Yasuko (Yûko Takeuchi), is with him and it looks like she might have chosen their new home -- a modest but nicely designed house with a tiny garden. Shortly after Takakura and Yasuko attempt to introduce themselves to their neighbors, however, they realize that no one truly cares who they are or where they come from. One of them, Nishino (Teruyuki Kagawa), even openly states that he does not appreciate Yasuko’s curiosity when she rings his bell and insists that he accepts her gift. At first Takakura and Yasuko ignore the cold rejections of their neighbors and assume that as time passes by they will warm up to them, but when even clearer signs emerge that they don’t want any sort of interaction with them some of the tension puts a strain on their relationship. Around the same time Takakura is approached by an ambitious young detective (Masahiro Higashide) who has been studying an old and unsolved mass murder case and the two begin spending time together, which allows Yasuko to unexpectedly befriend Nishino. The closer they become, the more Takakura begins to dislike him.

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s thriller Creepy has a running time of approximately 130 minutes but feels like it is twice as long. The main reason for this is its inexorable desire to get the right atmosphere for its story by basically overextending material that most of the time already feels flat-out redundant.

There are three characters that are used to legitimize the film’s abrupt plunge in horror territory during the second half and the majority of their actions are very difficult to justify in a rational manner. Here are a couple of examples: Mio (Ryôko Fujino), the young girl that approaches Takakura and reveals to him that her father is an impostor, is apparently overwhelmed by fear that forces her to hide a monster, but the man never emerges as an intelligent mind reader that can actually have that type of control over her. In fact, his public actions make the fear awfully suspicious and Mio’s attachment to him quite simply unbelievable. Yasuko’s complete transformation is also suspicious, with the mental blackout after her visit to the soundproof basement making zero sense. Why is she suddenly giving up on her husband, for what reason(s)? The film does not offer any information about their relationship to make the switch look credible. Then there is Takakura’s complete lack of awareness that Yasuko is obviously drifting away from him for reasons that have nothing to do with their interactions at home while his suspicion of Nishino continues to grow.

The film’s best moments are the ones where it moves away from the psychological games and works hard to shock with the graphic horror footage, which is why it should have been scripted as a conventional horror thriller. (If looking for an even stronger dose of insanity with a dash of delicious black humor, see Japanese auteur Sion Sono’s chiller Cold Fish).

Creepy Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.39:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Creepy arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Eureka Entertainment.

The high-definition transfer is outstanding. Obviously one of the reasons why the visuals are so striking is Kiyoshi Kurosawa's decision to shoot the film with the Arri Alexa XT Plus camera which can deliver some pretty astonishing results, but the color grading for instance also helps tremendously. A lot of the darker footage feels perfectly in sync with the desired tense atmosphere, and there are some very effective nuances that would have been very difficult to capture with older and more traditional cameras. During the daylight footage close-ups also boast exceptional clarity and depth. Image stability is superb. There are no encoding anomalies to report. (Note: This is a Region-B "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-B or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

Creepy Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There are two standard audio tracks on this Blu-ray release: Japanese DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and Japanese LPCM 2.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature. When turned on, they appear inside the image frame.

The film has a fully digital soundtrack, so I assume that the 5.1 track almost certainly replicates the exact audio mix that the creators of the film produced. Clarity and depth are outstanding, and there is very good range of nuanced dynamics that help the intended atmosphere. Balance is excellent. There are no audio dropouts or digital anomalies to report.

Creepy Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer - original trailer for Creepy. In Japanese, with imposed English subtitles. (2 min).

• Interview with Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa - in this video interviews, director Kiyoshi Kurosawa discusses the stylistic identity of Creepy, his management of action and dialogue scenes, his porfessional relationship with cinematographer Akiko Ashizawa and her working methods, the use of sound throughout the film, etc. In Japanese, with imposed English subtitles. 38 min).

• Booklet - illustrated booklet with new writing on the film.

Creepy Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

After the initial quite intriguing buildup I quickly lost interest in Creepy. Its entire story relies on a series of questionable decisions by a few characters that are essentially expected to make it look credible as a psychological thriller, but they struggle and it quickly becomes quite obvious. My feeling is that Creepy was probably meant to visit the same territory that Sion Sono's Cold Fish does, but there really is a sea of difference between them. If you have already seen Creepy and wish to pick up a copy for your collection, you will be pleased to know that Eureka Entertainment's technical presentation of the film is outstanding.