'GRUDGE' NOTICE AT CHUD.COM (Cinematic Happenings Under Development)

"Another Grudge Held"

1.8.04
By Dave Davis
Contributing sources: Variety

When Columbia's pseudo-Americanized version of The Grudge hits the States, it'll come with a pair of pretty faces that once graced the WB network.

Soft-spoken Roswell extraterrestrial Jason Behr (isn't he dreamy?) will co-star in the film alongside the former bane of bloodsuckers Sarah Michelle Gellar, as the pair get freaked out by unnerving noises and a blanched boy.

The film essentially revolves around a house in Japan where something terrible once happened, and how the supernatural curse affects anyone who steps foot inside its doors. Gellar plays a social worker, while Behr will be her college-student boyfriend.

In a rare example of maintaining an original film's aesthetics, Japanese director Takashi Shimizu is helming the English-language remake of his own creepy haunted house tale (originally titled Ju-On) for the first modest-budgeted production from Sam Raimi's Ghost House Pictures. The story's unsettling atmosphere and imagery have seen several previous incarnations in Japan, both cinematic and direct-to-video (featuring sexy young Kill Bill whirlwind Chiaki Kuriyama), all under Shimizu's control.

The American remake (being shot in Japan) should be on screens in time for Halloween 2004.

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"ROSWELL cast member holds a GRUDGE against the Slayer: Jason Behr reunites with Sarah Michelle Gellar"

photo 2003 copyright Sue Schneider, from In the Cut premiere

Dateline: Thursday, January 8, 2004

By: Patrick Sauriol
Source: Variety

Former ROSWELL star Jason Behr is reuniting with BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER's Sarah Michelle Gellar on the American remake of THE GRUDGE. Behr starred in an early episode of BUFFY before going on to lead the cast of ROSWELL. He will play Gellar's character's boyfriend in the film, a student in university at Tokyo.

Also revealed with today's casting news is the detail that Stephen Susco's script combines plot elements from all four films in the Japanese GRUDGE film series. The original picture concerned a virus-like curse that seems to make everyday people fall into a murderous fury before dying a violent death. Unlike other American remakes of Japanese horror films, THE GRUDGE is set in Japan and will be filmed on location beginning this month.

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