The story of the most terrifying sea monster in the land of the rising sun

The movie “Kappa: The Evil Spirit at the Bottom of the Lake” will be shown in Vietnamese cinemas from April 18, 2025.

“Kappa: The Evil Spirit of the Lake” is a horror thriller film directed and written by Pablo Absento and produced by Timur Bekmambetov, a pioneer of screenlife films, behind the success of Unfriended (2015) and Searching (2018).

Jack (Ben McKenzie) is a military officer in the US NATO bloc. Shortly after his wife, Hannah (Bojana Novakovic), unfortunately gave birth to a stillborn child, Jack took a leave of absence to be with his family. The family planned to travel to Japan to forget the pain of loss, however, Jack was ordered to return to military duty, causing the trip to be delayed.

Despite the absence of Jack, his wife Hannah and their two sons Steve (Malcolm Fuller), Kyle (Sawyer Jones) decides to travel to Japan. The hellish vacation begins when Kyle almost drowns in a small stream. After that, the boy suddenly shows strange signs and behaviors such as changing eye color, aggressively biting his brother and only eating cucumbers.

Notably, every time the camera approached Kyle, the screen would be distorted and unclear. This made Jack even more worried and determined to find out the cause with the technological devices in hand.

Through Internet research, Jack delves into Japanese folklore and discovers that his son may have been the victim of a Kappa - an ancient sea monster that hunts and kills children.

According to the description, Kappa is about the size of a 5-6 year old child, has shaggy hair, a long hooked nose, a fishy smelling body and a turtle shell on its back. Kappa loves to eat eggs, apples, cucumbers and human liver. In particular, Kappa has a hollow on its head to hold water, it is said that if the hollow on its head loses water, it will lose its strength.

Regarding the existence of Kappa, according to Japanese oral tradition, in the past, poor families who could not afford to raise their children threw their children into the river. Then, they transformed into Kappa to kidnap children playing in the river or near the river. This makes it easy for the audience to associate the Vietnamese "ghost" with real horror stories from the river area. This interesting similarity became a highlight that helped the film attract the attention of Vietnamese audiences as soon as it was announced to premiere.

Returning to the film “Kappa: The Evil Spirit at the Bottom of the Lake”, the filmmakers have cleverly incorporated the Japanese horror legend Kappa into a screenlife work with many twists, revealed through each click of the main character. This technique further enhances the mystery of Asian folklore, in a film full of technology, science and modernity by Hollywood filmmakers. The work promises to bring a new cinematic perspective to the audience and the whole screenlife film genre, which still has many aspects to explore.

The movie “Kappa: The Evil Spirit at the Bottom of the Lake” will be shown in Vietnamese cinemas from April 18, 2025.

Hai Yen

Source: https://baobariavungtau.com.vn/van-hoa-nghe-thuat/202504/cau-chuyen-ve-thuy-quai-dang-so-nhat-xu-phu-tang-1040122/