I would never imply that it’s easy to make a horror film (or any film, for that matter) but when you set your story in what is literally one of the most haunting locations on the face of the earth, it might make the most sense to let the surroundings do the work for you. I’ve been fascinated with the 13-square-mile area at the northwest base of Japan’s Mount Fuji known as Aokigahara for years. Whenever some article lists the creepiest places in the world, Aokigahara (also known as the Sea of Trees, but better known as the Suicide Forest) always lands somewhere near the top.
Even if you ignore the legends about wandering, angry spirits and random, inhuman screaming coming from parts unknown in the forest, Aokigahara is a terrifying prospect during the light of day. The trees are so tightly packed together that very little sunlight gets to the surface, adding an eerie quality to everything. But for reasons not quite understood, people travel from all over the country (even the world) to kill themselves in these woods, usually by hanging. There’s a sanctioned path running through the woods that no one ever stays on, and with more than 100-plus bodies found in this forest every year, the odds are strong that if you wander into the dense trees, you’ll find a body or perhaps someone contemplating suicide.
There are certain visual cues that THE FOREST gets right. There is colored tape strewn from tree to tree—some use it to mark their way in case they change their minds and want to get back to the path; others use it as a way for people to find their dead body. Every tape path leads to a different story—some with happy endings, some not. The other common find in the forest are people in tents, camping. The belief is that a tent is a sign that the person is unsure of whether suicide is the answer, and they are taking the time to contemplate their being in Aokigahara. Both the tape and tents figure prominently in The Forest, a sapling of a horror film from first-time feature director Jason Zada.
The story opens with Sara Price (Natalie Dormer of “Game of Thrones” and the two MOCKINGJAY films) getting a call that her twin sister Jess, who works as a teacher in Japan, was last seen several days earlier venturing into the Aokigahara. By the time Sara arrives in Japan, the local authorities believe her sister is long dead, but Sara’s special twin bond with Jess is telling her Jess is still alive and she sets out to find her. Before venturing in herself, Sara meets American travel writer Aiden (Taylor Kinney of “Chicago Fire”) working on a story about the forest. He just happens to already have a guide in Michi (Yukiyoshi Ozawa), and the three make their way into the woods and off the beaten path.
The film establishes a few rules about what we may see along the way. If you see something strange or scary, it probably is just the spirits messing with you, and you should ignore it. If you enter the woods with sadness in your heart, the spirits will use this against you to push you to kill yourself. Aokigahara is terrifying enough all on its own that adding mythology on top of it doesn’t really make it any scarier. You just point the camera in any direction and fear sets in rather quickly. It’s tough to separate the fact that the filmmakers actually shot in the real location, where people actually have committed suicide by the thousands over the years. Lay over a nicely atmospheric score by Bear McCreary, and this one should be a no-brainer.
But so little in horror is a no-brainer. And director Zada (working from a script by Nick Antosca, Sarah Cornwell and Ben Ketai) found it necessary to add unnecessary jump scares, flashes of creepy faces in the forest, and what seems like a prerequisite for making a horror film in Japan, a creepy school girl (Rina Takasaki) who wanders the woods and attempts to aid Sara in her search. As predicted, the Aokigahara plays tricks on Sara’s mind. She begins to get paranoid about the company she’s keeping, and after finding a camp site where her sister was for a time, she strays deep into the woods away from her guide, threatening to have the forest swallow her completely. There’s a whole back story in THE FOREST about how Sara and Jess had to endure the death of their parents when they were kids, none of which pays off as powerfully as simply walking further into those woods. Real life trumps artificial supernatural every time.
Beyond that, THE FOREST just feels tired and ordinary as a narrative. I’ve seen tourist videos of Aokigahara with more tension and skin-crawling visuals than this movie. And there’s this strange underlying sense that in order for us to find this film scary, we have to be slightly creeped out by Japanese culture, which doesn’t sit right at all.
Unrelated to that, think about this for a second. Sara comes to Japan looking for her Identical twin sister (played by her in flashbacks; the only thing dissimilar between them is their hair color). And she brings a photo of Jess to show people, as in “Have you seen this woman?” instead of, oh I don’t know, pointing to her own face and asking the same question. There’s a moment early on when Jess’s students see Sara and freak out, thinking it’s their teacher come back from the dead, so clearly…you get the point. And in a couple days, that storytelling flaw will be all I remember about THE FOREST. Go watch the newly dropped trailer for THE CONJURING 2; it’s much scarier.
