One Missed Call (2003) (2025)

Popular reviews

• Review by Héctor ★★★★★ 7

  every asian horror movie is literally ruined by the american version huh

• Review by Tony the Terror ★★★★★ 6

  Some people like to brush this off as a copycat film to Ringu, but the fact is that even if it does have a similar “cursed technological item” story, Miike elevates it above any normal standards and truly makes it a film (and series) of its own.

  I’d love to give you an in depth review right now, but I just spent the last part of my evening in a group chat with my friends waxing philosophical about a guy who makes YouTube videos of himself frolicking in strangers backyard cesspools. Yes it’s a real thing and yes these are the people I inexplicably enjoy spending my time with and I love them, but it does make writing a very…

• Review by Ian West ★★★

  Very much on brand with Ringuand Pulse, One Missed Callfeatures a great first act, ponders a bit in the middle before bringing it all home. Miike’s atmosphere is always on point throughout, especially during the tension drenched setpieces. Still though, as much as I liked revisiting this it’s very much a straight Miike jam, abandoning his signature surrealistic absurdities which I love so much. That works here though and One Missed Call is quite good, not in my top ten Miike or top Ten Japanese horror jams, but a creepy good tale for the early flip phone generation. The ring tone in this is one of the eeriest things I’ve ever heard and I kinda love it!

  Watched with my friend Michele, Good times!

• Review by ZaraGwen ★★★½ 2

  I have absolutely no idea what that ending was

• Review by Rafael "Parker!!" Jovine ★★★ 6

  In terms of tone, J-Horror films from the 90s and early 2000s might look very similar thanks to a very introspective tone, a slow burn, and the use of technology as a vehicle for vengeful entities to cause great suffering to the victim. In fact, as I watched this film, I couldn't help but notice how Miike and company sorta did a conceptually remake of "Ringu".

  However, unlike Hideo Nakata's classic, this one lacks the same consistency in terms of quality or how memorable it ends up being. In fact, this is one of the cases where I think the American remake had a greater impact on me, especially thanks to the main melody that functions as the theme that…

• Review by Aberrant Ghoul ★★★★½ 21

  In the decades that followed World War II, Japan became a country in transition. A country that wholeheartedly embraced technological advancement during this period of rapid economic growth. A country that embraced the future, perhaps in an effort to leave the bitter memory of the war behind them. To think of Japan in this way, however, only gives us a view of one side of the coin. While they embraced Western culture and technology with great zeal and fervor, Japan was also a country that clung tenaciously to its past, as well as its own rich cultural heritage. What emerged from the chrysalis of that postwar period was a country that existed simultaneously in two periods. Where you could cross…

• Review by MJsays ★★★½

  An unnerving little horror outing that’s just as messy as it is consistently spooky. It’s an odd one, but that kind of works in its favour.

• Review by Bob McQueen ★★★½

  Fun creepy little story about the cycle of abuse and making sure you keep your psychotic asthmatic daughter breathing.

• Review by Sam ★★★½

  This has dated incredibly aggressively and I'm not sure if the plot made thattt much sense but fuck me the scares work so well here. Despite his usual bombastic style, Miike really knows how to be subtle when a film calls for it

• Review by Blue Ghosts ★★★★

  Hey guys I have the dead girl phone with the ringtone that’s evil

• Review by Jerry McGlothlin ★★★ 2

  Trauma as anguish inherited—congenital cargo. A chain of energy is sent into the ether, built up over time and unleashed through oscillations of particles, the stark promulgations of propellant revenge, misguided and agrestal, seeking relief via the only known means: affliction. If abuse is borne out by factors and patterns evident in the behavior of -er and -ee, it resembles a scattered call log of personal cataclysms, bound, in many cases, to become a fiendish cycle. The hardest part appears to be redirecting that current and diverting the connection. The kind of fortitude it would take to accomplish this, I cannot even begin to imagine.

• Review by WraithApe ★★★ 2

  Miike phoning it in.

  Sorry, couldn't resist! One Missed Call is a slickly effective j-horror with scares in all the right places. The basic premise is that people receive a call on their mobile phone, apparently from their own number, which leaves an eerie voice-mail message foretelling of their imminent death. As one person is killed, another number is called from the victim's phone and so the 'virus' propagates.

  In a post-production interview, Miike reveals that he doesn't particularly like straight-up horror films; that he wants a bit more bang for his yen than a few cheap scares. Nevertheless, a straight-up horror is pretty much what he delivers here. Essentially, One Missed Call is derivative of the best j-horror: if…