N-Goto is a 2022 Japanese horror film about students who explore an old apartment building and find more than they bargained for. Also known as Bldg. N
Written and directed by Yōsuke Gotō (TV series: #Kôrudogêmu; Virevan!). Produced by Eiichi Sugaya.
The movie stars Minori Hagiwara, Kasumi Yamaya, Yuki Kura, Mariko Tsutsui, Tarô Suwa, Mariko Akama and Takashi Okabe.
Plot:
Three students, one of them named Shiori (Minori Hagiwara), question the purpose of life and the existence of the afterlife and take a trip to the countryside to explore what they believe to be an abandoned apartment building rumoured to be the home of spirits.
Upon arrival, they discover that there are a few dozen people living in the building, who welcome them into the building and encourage them to stay. But an unexplained supernatural event occurs, resulting in the suicide of one of the residents, which leads Shiori to try and uncover what is going on within the building and who is controlling all the residents…
Our review:
This is yet another Japanese urban legend movie, and yet another that seems to lean heavily on the audience knowing the lore before going into it. For the uninitiated, like myself, the first half of the movie sets up what should have been a fantastic film ending. We’ve got a few interesting main characters, a superbly spooky setting and a group of creepy apartment residents who appear to belong to some kind of death cult. And that’s the feeling I got from this film – that it was about some kind of death cult but with supernatural elements.
However, there is the classic horror movie trope where the main characters go up the stairs instead of out the front door – or in this movie’s case they go back into the apartment block rather than running away to freedom, and this is exactly the point where the whole movie falls apart. It no longer made any sense and nothing that the film was going to do from that point on was going to help it recover.
Technically the movie hits all the right notes. Great colour grading, spooky audio and muted effects – the only CGI in the film appears to be modifications done to the sky in certain scenes, everything else is practical effects. The finale and explanation let N-Goto down and with some tweaks, this could have been a modern cult classic.
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Other reviews:
” …the film devolves into the absurd since it never convincingly answers the question of why, with safety so close, Shiori and the others linger at the danchi, especially after it becomes obvious that Kanako is the leader of a bizarre death cult. Bldg. N provides an excellent example of what critic Roger Ebert called “the idiot plot” — that is, a plot sustained solely by the fact that key characters are idiots.” The Japan Times
Original title:
N号棟
Release date:
The film was released in Japan on April 22, 2022.
YouTube review:
Technical specs:
1 hour 43 minutes
