Tomie: Beginning was a Netflix DVD recommendation. Little did I know that the Tomie series is a big time franchise in Japan - at least as far as number of sequels go. Including DTV sequels, there are nine films and counting in the series. At first glance, you may think this is the first one (what with the word "beginning" and all), but it turns out Beginning is the fifth installment... it's just a prequel. I never felt lost or confused or anything though - it felt just as confusing and out there as just about any other Japanese ghost film I've seen. There's just some crazy randomness with Tomie (the titular ghost/spirit/whatever it is), but I highly doubt that things like her ear crawling off like a spider when it gets cut off is explained in an earlier film. So just like you could probably watch Wrong Turn 4: Bloody Beginnings and catch on all right, you can probably hang with Tomie: Beginning as well.
Anyways, what we have here is your typical high school class, boys and girls, at a school... somewhere. I'm not too sure about the typical Japanese high school experience, but the school seems to be way out in the middle of nowhere. Plus, when the kids don't go home one night, parents don't seem to be a concern at all. In fact, other than the teacher, I don't think there is a single parent/authority figure in the film. At any rate, it's a pretty normal school until a new girl named Tomie shows up. She's unquestionably gorgeous, and has an almost supernatural effect on the other students. Every boy in class is instantly smitten with (or more like obsessed with) her, and all of the girls are extremely angry with her. The one exception is Reiko - she seems to relate to her lonely and somewhat sad disposition.
One day, after a run in with the girls, Tomie shows off some supernatural capabilities - and when the boys (inexplicably) want to kill her all of a sudden, we see she has some regenerative powers as well. But even her confidant Reiko, who suspects a little funny business, is shocked at just how disturbing Tomie's powers really are.
The overall structure of Tomie: Beginning is noteworthy. The film starts many years after Tomie's first reign of terror. The surviving students (or at least those who are up to it) reconvene at the old school, and the head count of this bizarre reunion is two - Reiko and Yamamoto (one of the boys who got crazy obsessed with Tomie way back when). Most of the movie cuts back and forth between this reunion and flashbacks, when Reiko tells her perspective of things when Tomie first showed up. So while the framing device isn't anything special, it probably saves the film from being a drag. I mean, the flashback scenes aren't dreadful, but they are pretty uninspired a lot of the time. At least there's some present day footage intermixed in there to break things up a bit, you know? Without it, Tomie: Beginning would be a pretty rough 50-some minutes. With it? A tolerable 70-some.
But Tomie: Beginning is not without its moments. There are a couple of individual scenes that work pretty well. Tomie (a Tomie? I'm not sure of the proper nomenclature) manifesting in a pile of clothes is a nicely done, creepy effect, and the classmates' violent solution to their Tomie problem is bizarro fun. Also, I kind of dug the way it ends (with the climax taking place in the present day). But these fun scenes are just that - fun parts in an otherwise unengaging story. It's never outright bad, but the characters and the plot just never grab you, you know?
The horror stuff is okay, but it's not going to change your opinion on the film. There's a little bit of J-horror ghost stuff, a little splatter, a little monster stop-motion... it's a decent sampler. And while it's mostly well-done, none of it is strong enough (or ever-present enough) to make the film worth checking out based on the gore/effects alone.
Plus, the whole thing just looks pretty bad. I'm guessing this was pretty early on in the HD camera (or some other) trend. You get the feeling that the filmmakers just aren't comfortable with how to shoot/light things. Some shots look fine, and some are really, really bad.
Overall, Tomie: Beginning is just okay. It's never a total drag... it's pretty short and the alternating present day/flashbacks keep things interesting. But overall, there just isn't much here to get excited about.
I would really hem and haw, but probably not recommend this film.
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