The Shock Labyrinth aka Senritsu meikyû (2009) Blu-ray 3D [Region Free] [USA only]

[Jsmith82]

Originally Posted by Wiki

Synopsis: Its a story of a group of teenagers with a shared mysterious past, that are confronted suddenly with the return of a friend who was thought to be dead. After the friend, Yuki, falls ill, they take her to a hospital only to find out it is a labyrinth.

Also to note, the director was Takashi Shimizu, known well for The Grudge and Grudge 2.

A group of us watched this Friday night, we really enjoyed it which surprised me given the amount of negative reviews it has on the web. There are few parts one would deem "scary" (though there are 2 or 3 "jumpers") and a bit of over acting - I'll admit that lol, however we found it to be more of a psychological thriller / horror than a flat out horror movie. More forcing one to remember suppressed memories than a revenge flick.

You can count the cast on a couple of hands and the majority of the movie is filmed in a single building leading me to believe the budget for this wasn't great, in this aspect I think Takashi did pretty well. Some of the effects like rain, rain drops stopping and floating, feathers, etc... These floating objects added in post production looked good but they messed up some of the depth layers for instance, a water drop that should be waaay back in the scene floats in front of a person that standing in the front of the scene, it causes confusion to your eyes because the thing that should be behind the actor is in front of him. Don't let that scare you out of this though, I only noticed it once or twice. I caught very little ghosting in a scene or two, not much though.

Notably, this was filmed in High Definition 3D - the first Japanese film to do so, not a conversion, and it really shows. There are some great depth shots as well as some really well made pop out moments, some pops are out so far it was a little strenuous on the eyes.

This film is in Japanese 5.1, subtitled in English. You can turn these titles off, there is also a dub track in English 5.1. As for the voice overs... well, compared to others I've heard they weren't toooo bad Some of what I thought was overacting may have been the fault of the voice actors dub track, the emotional level seemed off at times and WAAAAY to strong at others.

Over all, I'd give this a 3 out of 5. It was enjoyable and I'll watch it again down the road, more I can say for half the movies I own. For 19.99 (purchased at Best Buy), I'm satisfied with the purchase.