Linbeymusol Wonderful character development!

filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Bluebell Alcock Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Boba_Fett1138 Now, doesn't the premise of this movie sounds just awesome and interesting? A movie in which hair extensions attack and kill those that wear them, how could this movie not be awesome? Well, for one because it picks a totally strange and wrong approach to its subject.The movie is a horror but only with its main premise. The movie itself picks a more dramatic approach, while the horror moments are mostly being comical and over-the-top ones. It's such a weird mixture of different genres, that doesn't quite work out that great or ever becomes very interesting to watch.At first I actually thought this was going to be a parody of the Japanese horror genre but then suddenly it started to take a very serious and more straightforward approach with all of its dramatic story elements. I just don't know how to take this movie and I wonder if the film-makers themselves knew what direction they were going for.Because the movie is mostly being a drama, it also means that it has a slow pace and buildup to it. Nothing wrong with that, as long as there is something good or interesting going on in the story as well. And that really isn't always the case in this movie. As a matter of fact, even though this is a well under 2 hours short movie, it still feels like a much longer one.I feel that the movie could had truly benefited more from its horror. It should had done more with it, since it actually was the horror that still made this movie somewhat worthwhile. Yes, it has a ridicules concept but that's why it also works and becomes an original and interesting one with its horror. Also the effects looked pretty decent and some more killings or gore could had really spiced up things for this movie. The potential and possibilities were all there but the movie never really fully uses any it.A strange mixture of far too many genres. It's not all that bad but it still remains a just too big of a waste, of some fine potential.6/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Scarecrow-88 Positively bizarre supernatural Japanese horror regarding killer hair extensions! A female corpse is found engulfed in hair, her organs removed by those black market surgeons, and becomes the immediate fixation of a nutty mortician who kidnaps her body taking it home with him. Enamoured with her hair, Gunji Yamazaki(Ren Osgui) begins furnishing salons "samples" with horrifying results. The film focuses on hair stylist Yuko Mizushima(Chiaki Kuriyama), a young apprentice in a salon whose cruel sister, Kiyomi(Tsugumi)drops in unannounced to cause disturbance, leaving behind an abused daughter, Mami(Miku Sato)while embarking in a relationship with a sleazy lover at night. Yuko and Mami form a bond as Kiyomi is away ruining her life, while the hair extensions used from the dead girl cause death to customers. The extensions carry the hostile feelings of the dead girl and those who happen to wear the hair are recipients of the vengeance she so desperately harbors. Soon Yamazaki will drop off samples at the salon for which Yuko works bringing the separate stories together. Also, Yamazaki, with an unhealthy obsession with hair, is drawn to Yuko and Mami and wishes to possess what they have..beautiful hair, of course. We also follow two detectives pursuing the one responsible for kidnapping the corpse and how their search will soon lead to Yuko and Yamazaki. Unsettling violence to human victims mainly displaying how hair bursts from body orifices and wounds, increasing in size as it flows out, often wrapping around arms and throats, out eye sockets, even bleeding when cut by scissors. The film really gets serious with Mami's neglect at the hands of a monstrous mother, whose presence yields nothing but anguish and misery. That bitch gets hers, though. Chiaki Kuriyama is a very likable lead with a wonderful smile that lights up the screen, and a pleasant disposition that is a direct opposite of her polarizing sister. The film grows darker and darker as Yamazaki becomes more and more unhinged, his home besieged by the corpses hair as it grows following fits of anger during violent acts towards victims. You just have to see this to believe it!

dschmeding I was expecting everything but what I got from this strange little movie. Its far from your typical Japanese "scary girl with long black hair moves in creepy way" movies. After the credits rolled I was more reminded of crazy stuff like "Organ" or some of the Miike movies. "Exte" already starts of like a romantic movie with an overly happy girl riding bike, talking about her life from off screen while some nice pictures float by. Then the movie is full with some rather crazy characters... her sister is a kind of gangster whore who beats her little daughter and steals the main characters stuff, there is a guy obsessed with hair who steals it from dead bodies in the morgue and then there is a girl who was harvested for organs and who can't rest because "her hair is raging". Obviously these are soon connected when crazy hair guy steals raging hair girls body and starts selling her hair to happy hair girl who works as a hairdresser. By then she took her sisters daughter from her rather demented mother to take care of her and things get weird.... guess what, with a lot of hair!!!The horror element is inserted with people who get infected by the angry girls hair and start growing hair from their eyes, wounds and about everywhere. While at first this works pretty well the effect is so blatantly overused that by the point it gets really annoying you suddenly realize that this movie is not to be taken serious by an inch. Especially in the end there are some unbelievably ridiculous scenes that really made me laugh and with some of the scary and creepy stuff (like the organ harvesting) the whole movie is pretty schizophrenic and weird, especially because the touching life story of a hairdresser is presented around the main character regularly in a TV soap opera fashion.Believe me, this movie is STRANGE!!! The mix of horror and gore (while here barely any blood is used but rather replaced with hair) and totally ridiculous slapstick elements reminds a lot of "Organ". So if you like this kind of movie and love Takashi Miikes way of mixing all kinds of genres into one strange movie you will surely like "Exte" too. To me its not much about average because none of the elements work for themselves and the whole thing seems a little disjointed. Anyway I had a laugh and some scenes and effects are really new to me. Be sure to watch the evil hair troll at the end in continuous repeat to wet your pants.

jmaruyama Possessed body parts are nothing new to the film horror genre. There have been a number of movies about cursed eyes (The Eye), demonic hands (Idle Hands, The Hand), sinister facial grafts (Tanin No Kao), reanimated human tissue (Re-Animator) and haunted arms (Body Parts) but none have been stranger than Sono Sion's latest creepy thriller "Exte" which has to be a first in the annals of movie horror with its subject matter - cursed hair.Starring Kuriyama Chiaki (she of the big nose and "Olive Oyl" lanky figure), the movie is a bizarre tale of a vengeful spirit of a young girl, who was the victim of illegal organ harvesting, left to die but only to have her restless spirit manifest itself as living "demonic" hair which would possess its victims (by entering into their body) and manipulate the host's own hair follicles to often deadly effects (rapid growth which would result in strangulation and suffocation).While the plot may sound utterly ridiculous, "Exte" is a surprisingly effective horror film with several moments of genuine terror.Kuriyama plays Mizushima Yuko, a fledgling beautician in a small coastal Japanese town. She is training with a local stylist(Yamamoto Mirai) at a beauty salon called "Gilles de Rais" (odd that a salon would be named after a French aristocratic serial killer and murder of children).Her world would soon be turned upside down by the sudden appearance of her young niece, Mami (Sato Miku) who is the daughter of her older sister Kiyomi (Tsugumi). Mami has been abandoned by her witch of a mother and now Yuko and her roommate Yuki (Sato Megumi) must care for her. They will soon discover that she has also been severely abused by Kiyomi, to the point that Mami is emotionally and psychologically scarred.As Yuko tries to deal with this personal problem. A gruesome discovery is made at one of the local shipping docks. A dead body of a young girl is found in a shipping container filled with human hair. Upon further examination, the body is discovered to be filled with human hair. A hair fetish "Otaku" Yamazaki Gunji (Osugi Ren) who happens to work in the morgue, steals the body and soon realizes that this body can rapidly grown hair not only from the head but also from various open orifices (the mouth, eyes, ears, open cuts). He soon decides (or rather is compelled) to sell this special hair to the local hair salons as "exte" (hair extensions).Unfortunately, these "exte" have a life of their own and soon possess and kill the women that the hair is attached to. Yamazaki is also driven crazy by the haunted hair and soon seeks out other victims with beautiful hair, with Yuko and Mami being such women. Yuko must not only protect Mami from Gunji but also from Kiyomi who has returned to take back Mami.The screenplay by Sono(Kimyo Na Circus, Noriko No Shokutaku) and Adachi Masaki (who served as Second Director on movies such as "Ju-On:The Grudge" and "Honogurai Mizu No Soko Kara) is a hopelessly contrived story but one that is done surprisingly well and with straight-faced seriousness. It is amazing how creepy some of the SFX effects work with the hair and albeit there are some scenes which border on the absurd and cartoonish the overall horror effects are shocking.One nagging plot point however is never really explained. We never really know who the young girl is in the container and while there are flashbacks of her ordeal before her death, Sono refuses to give us any details of her life or explanations as to how she is able to reanimate and control her body hair. It's an irritatingly MacGuffin contrivance but one that doesn't really kill the entertainment value of the film.Kuriyama plays her part well and is quite good as Yuko. Child actress Sato Miku is definitely the standout with her portrayal of the abused Mami. While Osugi's manic and over-the-top villainy as Yamazaki is pure camp, the real chilling performance is Tsugumi's "mother from hell" Kiyomi. She is the true monster in this movie and her "Mommy Dearest" abusiveness to Mami will definitely spark much hatred for her character.J-Dorama fans will recognize a lot of familiar faces in this Toei movie with Natsuo Yuna, Ebisu Yoshikazu, Sakuma Mayu all having small parts/cameos in the movie."Exte" is nowhere near as good as "Juon", "Ring" or other seminal supernatural J-Horror films of late but is still an effective thriller. Despite the hopelessly unbelievable plot, sometimes cartoonish special effects, and Osugi's tongue-in-cheek performance, the film somehow works.