The Ring Two
Encyclopedia
The Ring Two is a 2005 American psychological horror
Psychological horror
Psychological horror is a subgenre of horror fiction that relies on character fears, guilt, beliefs, eerie sound effects, relevant music and emotional instability to build tension and further the plot...

 film, and a sequel
Sequel
A sequel is a narrative, documental, or other work of literature, film, theatre, or music that continues the story of or expands upon issues presented in some previous work...

 to the 2002 film The Ring
The Ring (2002 film)
The Ring is a 2002 American psychological horror film directed by Gore Verbinski and starring Naomi Watts and Martin Henderson. It is a remake of the 1998 Japanese horror film Ring....

, which was a remake
Remake
A remake is a piece of media based primarily on an earlier work of the same medium.-Film:The term "remake" is generally used in reference to a movie which uses an earlier movie as the main source material, rather than in reference to a second, later movie based on the same source...

 of the 1998 Japanese film Ring
Ring (film)
is a 1998 Japanese horror film by Hideo Nakata, adapted from the novel Ring by Kōji Suzuki, which in turn draws on the Japanese folk tale Banchō Sarayashiki. The film stars Nanako Matsushima, Hiroyuki Sanada, and Rikiya Ōtaka as members of a divorced family...

. Hideo Nakata
Hideo Nakata
Hideo Nakata is a Japanese filmmaker.-Life and career:Nakata was born in Okayama, Japan. He is most familiar to Western audiences for his work on Japanese horror films such as Ring , Ring 2 and Dark Water...

, director of the original Japanese films Ring and Ring 2
Ring 2
, directed by Hideo Nakata, is the sequel to the Japanese horror film, Ring.Ring was originally a novel written by Koji Suzuki; its sequel, Rasen , was also adapted into a movie as the Ring movie's sequel...

on which the American versions are based, is the director of this film in place of Gore Verbinski
Gore Verbinski
Gregor "Gore" Verbinski is an American film director, writer and musician. He is best known for directing the films The Ring, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Rango.-Early life:...

.

This sequel is not based on any of the previous Japanese sequels to Ring, and is an original storyline, continuing from The Ring.

The movie was filmed in Astoria, Oregon
Astoria, Oregon
Astoria is the county seat of Clatsop County, Oregon, United States. Situated near the mouth of the Columbia River, the city was named after the American investor John Jacob Astor. His American Fur Company founded Fort Astoria at the site in 1811...

 and Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

. It was released on March 18, 2005, and opened with a strong US$35 million its first weekend, more than doubling the opening weekend of The Ring. Its final $75 million gross was far less than the original's $129 million total.

Plot

Approximately six months after the events of the first movie
The Ring (2002 film)
The Ring is a 2002 American psychological horror film directed by Gore Verbinski and starring Naomi Watts and Martin Henderson. It is a remake of the 1998 Japanese horror film Ring....

, Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts
Naomi Watts
Naomi Ellen Watts is a British actress. Watts began her career in Australian television, where she appeared in series such as Hey Dad..! , Brides of Christ , and Home and Away . Her film debut was the 1986 drama For Love Alone...

) and her son Aidan (David Dorfman
David Dorfman
David Dorfman is an American teen actor. His most notable role was as Aidan Keller in the 2002 horror film remake The Ring, and its 2005 sequel The Ring Two. He has also appeared in the 2000 film Panic as Sammy. Some people may remember him as the character "Charles Wallace Murry" in the film...

) have moved from Seattle to the quiet coastal community of Astoria, Oregon
Astoria, Oregon
Astoria is the county seat of Clatsop County, Oregon, United States. Situated near the mouth of the Columbia River, the city was named after the American investor John Jacob Astor. His American Fur Company founded Fort Astoria at the site in 1811...

. Rachel begins a new job at the Daily Astorian, a local newspaper, working for Max Rourke (Simon Baker
Simon Baker
Simon Baker is an Australian actor. Since 2008, he has starred in the CBS television series The Mentalist.-Early life:...

). Before long, there is news of a teenage homicide
Homicide
Homicide refers to the act of a human killing another human. Murder, for example, is a type of homicide. It can also describe a person who has committed such an act, though this use is rare in modern English...

 in town. Rachel investigates, finding the dead boy's face shows a deformed expression of horror just like the previous victims of Samara Morgan's cursed tape. Upon finding the boy's corpse, she also has a vision of Samara grabbing her and declaring "I found you." After that she goes to the police station in order to talk to the girl who witnessed the boy's death and after persuading the girl to tell her she finds out where the tape is. She takes the tape deep into the woods and burns it.

Aidan has a dream in which he comes down to the T.V. room without Rachel home, and is pulled into the screen by Samara when the videotape starts. Back at home, Aidan starts to develop hypothermia
Hypothermia
Hypothermia is a condition in which core temperature drops below the required temperature for normal metabolism and body functions which is defined as . Body temperature is usually maintained near a constant level of through biologic homeostasis or thermoregulation...

, and his body is suddenly covered with bruises. At a county fair, Aidan takes pictures of himself in the bathroom mirror, with a blurred Samara standing behind him. His behavior grows increasingly odd and distant, and whilst driving back from the fair, the car carrying Aidan and Rachel is repeatedly attacked by a deer, nearly killing them. This event was apparently mysteriously foreseen by Aidan, who warned Rachel of impending danger seconds before the deer came out of nowhere. Strange occurrences within their house (including visions of Samara, a burn mark in the wall which resembles the tree from the cursed video, and seeming poltergeist activity) frighten Rachel, leading her and Aidan to flee. Rachel subsequently asks Max if he can take care of the increasingly sick Aidan at his house.

Max says that Aidan's condition merits a trip to the hospital, but Rachel, knowing that his illness is unnatural, is adamant that traditional doctors cannot help him. When Rachel attempts to give Aidan (who suddenly develops a mysterious fear of water) a warm bath at Max's, a series of paranormal events leads to Rachel seeing Aidan's body replaced by Samara. Max walks in when she attempts to drown Samara, and sees her trying to drown Aidan instead. Suspicious, he insists on taking Aidan to the hospital against her wishes, stating, "You wanted my help, now you're getting it."

Based on the bruises on Aidan's body, the hospital staff, particularly psychiatrist Dr. Emma Temple (Elizabeth Perkins
Elizabeth Perkins
Elizabeth Ann Perkins is an American actress. Her film roles have included Big, The Flintstones, Miracle on 34th Street, About Last Night..., and Avalon...

), suspect child abuse on Rachel's part, because Rachel reveals she suffered from postpartum depression
Postpartum depression
Postpartum depression , also called postnatal depression, is a form of clinical depression which can affect women, and less frequently men, typically after childbirth. Studies report prevalence rates among women from 5% to 25%, but methodological differences among the studies make the actual...

, and won't allow her to be near her son. Desperate for answers, Rachel flees the hospital and travels to Seattle to dig deeper into Samara's past. Knowing that Samara was not Richard and Anna Morgan's biological child, she tracks down Samara's birth mother, Evelyn (Sissy Spacek
Sissy Spacek
Sissy Spacek is an American actress and singer. She came to international prominence for her for role as Carrie White in Brian De Palma's 1976 horror film Carrie for which she earned her first Academy Award nomination...

), who tried to drown Samara as an infant and has been living in a mental institution ever since. Meanwhile, Samara (in Aidan's body) inflicts a psychic
Psychic
A psychic is a person who professes an ability to perceive information hidden from the normal senses through extrasensory perception , or is said by others to have such abilities. It is also used to describe theatrical performers who use techniques such as prestidigitation, cold reading, and hot...

 assault on Dr. Temple, forcing Dr. Temple to commit suicide so that Samara (in Aidan's body) can escape the hospital.

Evelyn advises Rachel to "listen to her baby" when she seeks advice on how to deal with Samara. Max goes to Rachel's house to check on her, only to find Aidan watching TV alone. He attempts to surreptitiously capture Aidan on film in order to reveal Samara, as Aidan had before Samara possessed him. Aidan/Samara notices the camera. When Rachel returns home, she finds Max's car parked outside and his dead body inside with the same warped expression of Samara's other victims. Disturbed and unsure of what to do, Rachel then goes inside to face her possessed son.

Rachel tells Aidan/Samara that he should go to sleep. Aidan responds that he never sleeps. She suggests she make him something to eat. Rachel goes into the kitchen, preparing two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. On one sandwich, she puts sleeping medication, intended to make Aidan unconscious. After eating the sandwich, Aidan soon falls asleep.

Rachel fills the upstairs bathtub with water and holds an unconscious Aidan underwater. Samara's spirit leaves his body, and Rachel is then able to revive him. However, Samara attempts to come back into the house through the TV set. Rachel grabs onto Samara as she is emerging, and is pulled into Samara's well inside the world of the cursed video. Looking up, Rachel realizes that the well lid is always left open. Rachel begins climbing the side of the well. Halfway up, Samara emerges from the water below and also ascends in a very inhuman fashion. As Rachel is climbing out of the well, Samara grabs her leg. Rachel manages to shake her off and then causes a jet of water to come out of the side of the well. Samara loses her grip and falls back down the well, however, she begins climbing again at a rapid rate. Rachel climbs out of the well just as Samara cries '"Mommy!"' in a deep voice. Rachel responds angrily that she's not her mother and pushes the lid shut just as Samara is about to escape, trapping her in the well.

As Rachel wanders the monochromatic
Monochrome
Monochrome describes paintings, drawings, design, or photographs in one color or shades of one color. A monochromatic object or image has colors in shades of limited colors or hues. Images using only shades of grey are called grayscale or black-and-white...

 world of the cursed tape, she hears Aidan's voice and walks toward it, only to come to the cliff where Anna Morgan jumped to her death. She hears Aidan calling her name below. Determined to follow Aidan's voice, Rachel jumps off the cliff and ends up back in her living room with Aidan, where they embrace. Aidan calls Rachel '"Mommy"', and she asks him to just call her Rachel. The film ends when the camera then views the street and the sky, where a crescent moon
Lunar phase
A lunar phase or phase of the moon is the appearance of the illuminated portion of the Moon as seen by an observer, usually on Earth. The lunar phases change cyclically as the Moon orbits the Earth, according to the changing relative positions of the Earth, Moon, and Sun...

 can still be seen. The film then flickers out.

Cast and characters

  • Naomi Watts
    Naomi Watts
    Naomi Ellen Watts is a British actress. Watts began her career in Australian television, where she appeared in series such as Hey Dad..! , Brides of Christ , and Home and Away . Her film debut was the 1986 drama For Love Alone...

     as Rachel Keller
  • David Dorfman
    David Dorfman
    David Dorfman is an American teen actor. His most notable role was as Aidan Keller in the 2002 horror film remake The Ring, and its 2005 sequel The Ring Two. He has also appeared in the 2000 film Panic as Sammy. Some people may remember him as the character "Charles Wallace Murry" in the film...

     as Aidan Keller
  • Simon Baker
    Simon Baker
    Simon Baker is an Australian actor. Since 2008, he has starred in the CBS television series The Mentalist.-Early life:...

     as Max Rourke (Killed by Samara).
  • Elizabeth Perkins
    Elizabeth Perkins
    Elizabeth Ann Perkins is an American actress. Her film roles have included Big, The Flintstones, Miracle on 34th Street, About Last Night..., and Avalon...

     as Dr. Emma Temple (Killed by Samara).
  • Terry Crews
    Terry Crews
    Terrence Alan "Terry" Crews is an American actor, comedian, voice artist and a former player in the National Football League....

     as Martin Savidge
  • Daveigh Chase
    Daveigh Chase
    Daveigh Elizabeth Chase is an American actress, singer, and voice over artist best known for playing Rhonda Volmer in the HBO series Big Love, Samara Morgan in The Ring and Lilo Pelekai in Lilo & Stitch.-Early life:Chase was born Daveigh Elizabeth Chase-Schwallier in Las Vegas, Nevada, but her...

     as Samara Morgan (archive footage
    Stock footage
    Stock footage, and similarly, archive footage, library pictures and file footage are film or video footage that may or may not be custom shot for use in a specific film or television program. Stock footage is of beneficial use to filmmakers as it is sometimes less expensive than shooting new...

    )
  • Sissy Spacek
    Sissy Spacek
    Sissy Spacek is an American actress and singer. She came to international prominence for her for role as Carrie White in Brian De Palma's 1976 horror film Carrie for which she earned her first Academy Award nomination...

     as Evelyn
  • Ryan Merriman
    Ryan Merriman
    Ryan Earl Merriman is an American actor. He began his acting career as a child actor during the mid-1990s and has appeared in several feature films and television shows.-Background:...

     as Jake (Killed by Samara).
  • Emily VanCamp
    Emily VanCamp
    Emily Irene VanCamp is a Canadian actress. She is best known for her roles on the WB series Everwood as Amy Abbott and on the ABC series Brothers & Sisters as Rebecca Harper...

     as Emily
  • Kelly Stables
    Kelly Stables
    Kelly Michelle Stables is an American actress known for both stage and film acting.-Personal life:Stables was born in metropolitan St. Louis, Missouri. She was a well-known cheerleader in her high school years, a fact which would be commemorated in an article in the magazine American Cheerleader...

     as Evil Samara
  • Mary Elizabeth Winstead
    Mary Elizabeth Winstead
    Mary Elizabeth Winstead is an American actress. She is best known for her scream queen roles in the horror films Final Destination 3, Black Christmas, Death Proof, and The Thing...

     as Young Evelyn

Releases

In the Unrated Edition
Motion picture rating system
A motion picture rating system is designated to classify films with regard to suitability for audiences in terms of issues such as sex, violence, substance abuse, profanity, impudence or other types of mature content...

 DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

 release, a few extra scenes were included that were not in the theatrical release. These scenes included conversations with Rachel's new neighbor (and neighborhood gossip), numerous additions in which Max shows a romantic interest in Rachel, more scenes with Samara prior to her possession of Aidan (including one in which she is shown to enter him in the restroom at the local fair), and the short film Rings
Rings (short film)
Rings is a 2005 American horror short film. It was initially released as an extra disc with a re-release of The Ring on DVD. The events in Rings lead up to the sequel The Ring Two, on whose DVD Rings is also included as a bonus feature....

(which was also included on a special edition of The Ring released just before The Ring Two arrived in theaters). A scene in the theatrical cut in which Aidan first encounters a deer while wandering the local fair (prior to the deer attack) has also been removed from this version. Also, some musical cues were changed such as when Samara leaps out of the well in the opening scene.

Reception

The Ring Two received negative reviews with a current positive rating of 20% on Rotten Tomatoes. Metacritic gives the movie a 69 out of a possible 100. The main complaint was the script and screenplay, which some critics thought was dull and "littered with plot holes", but Naomi Watts' performance as Rachel Keller was praised by critics.

Sequel

In April 2010, Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...

announced its plans for a sequel that would be titled Ring 3D. A screenplay was written by David Loucka.
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