Asuka is a high school student who’s a bit of a loner. She’s very shy, apparently doesn’t have any friends, and keeps walking to school by herself while the other students keep laughing and clinging together. Then everything changes when Asuka sees the apparition of a dead girl named Haruka, who simply asks her to “find her body“. After some other strange incidents during the day, Asuka gets back home like it’s just been another normal day in Japan, preparing for the next lonely day at school. Well, she’s in for a new kind of normal from now on. After going to sleep, she wakes up in the middle of the night together with several of her classmates. They’re inside the school, and no one has any idea how they got there. What they quickly find out, however, is that they are now part of some kind of occult game called “Body Search“, and they need to find the eight pieces of Haruka’s body and place it inside a coffin. Sounds like fun, eh?
Not exactly, as their biggest problem isn’t finding the body parts, but being stalked and killed by an entity called the Red Person. When the first night is over, the Red Person has successfully killed them all before they’ve been able to find as much as a single body part. Game Over? Nope, it seems we have a fair share of continues. Asuka wakes up, and initially believes it all to be a strange nightmare…but the date remains the same as of yesterday. Her mother repeats the same lines and actions from the day before. Asuka and the other students who were with her on the Body Search last night, are all now stuck in a time loop. And they will all remain stuck, until they’ve found all of Haruka’s body parts.
Re/Member is a Japanese horror film directed by Eiichirō Hasumi, produced by Warner Bros. Japan. It is based on a Japanese manga series called Karada Sagashi, written by Welzard and illustrated by Katsutoshi Murase. Upon checking this movie out on Netflix we didn’t know much about it, and plot-wise I was actually surprised it wasn’t based off of a video game. The whole setting is quite reminiscent of Corpse Party, the RPG Maker indie game which also centers around a group of students in a school, chased by a girl in red. In the world of the supernatural, the “Lady in Red“ is often a very benevolent ghost, compared to her more friendly counterpart the Lady in White, which is mostly a western thing. I guess red means danger even in the ghost world.
The movie starts off very straightforward, presenting the characters and mystery in a somewhat generic manner but it’s still interesting enough from the get-go, and I really liked the build-up of atmosphere and mystery, together with some nice kills. The pacing can sometimes feel pretty wonky though, where it’s trying to balance gory horror with the anime-esque romantic comedy elements. But overall I never found myself bored with it. From the introduction of the characters, the old murder mystery and the Body Search itself, it was all packed with enough suspense and atmosphere to always keep me interested. It’s also such a huge plus that it doesn’t shy away from showing some gory kill scenes! And, while this is too much fun and action-packed to really be scary, it did manage to build some tight, creepy atmosphere in several of the scenes. And my heart always melts a little when I see the use of practical effects. Sure, there is some CGI here too, but a good amount of practical is used here which looks way more decent than the CGI (which is often the case). Nothing had me prepared for the scenes later in the movie involving a monster though! It’s such a fun mix of uncanny, goofy and creepy at the same time. Must’ve been a struggle for the actor inside that costume though…
Re/Member was more fun that I’d expected it to be, and despite some pacing issues here and there and some strange tonal shifts, I had a pretty good time with it. I totally loved some of the old-school practical effects, especially for the monster. While it’s not exactly anything groundbreaking or awesome, it’s a fun Japanese teen-horror movie mixing supernatural elements with time loops and monsters.
In 2025 a sequel to this movie was released, called Re/Member: The Last Night. And this takes a considerably bigger tonal shift where it’s much more of a teen comedy. Wasn’t our thing, but if you’re interested in checking it out it’s also available on Netflix, at least in some regions.
Director: Eiichirô Hasumi
Writer: Harumi Doki
Country & year: Japan, 2022
Actors: Kanna Hashimoto, Gordon Maeda, Maika Yamamoto, Fûju Kamio, Kotaro Daigo, Mayu Yokota, Yumemi Ishida
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt21250176/
