Before there was Bloody Disgusting there was J-horror. And before the internet became the beast that is it today, you had to hunt down those super rare horror films that would gain hype overseas for years before ever arriving here in the States. In 1999/2000, my treasure was a VHS copy of Ringu (translated to Ring), Hideo Nakata‘s Japanese masterpiece in which a reporter and her ex-husband investigate a cursed videotape that is rumored to kill the viewer seven days after watching it. It is the direct inspiration for Bloody Disgusting’s V/H/S and would cause this horror fan to turn into an import junkie. I had to have it all, and would get my hands on everything from Versus to Uzumaki (Spiral) before anyone here in the States even knew it existed. Well, everyone except Roy Lee, Vertigo Entertainment’s co-founder who remade Nakata’s film for DreamWorks in 2002. It would gross $250M globally, introducing the world to J-horror cinema, while also igniting the J-horror remake craze. This movement’s fingerprints can still be seen throughout the genre, and there are reboots that are even still in the works, including Grudge.

Super long story short, many of our younger readers may not have seen Ringu, and our longstanding fans probably watched a crappy bootleg years ago. Celebrating its 20th anniversary, the film has been restored and we’re finally going to be able to see it in its full glory. Unfortunately, it’s a UK exclusive.

Arrow Video announced a March 1 theatrical release date, while the exclusive Blu-ray set arrives on March 18th. Such, we got our hands on hi-res screengrabs from the new restoration that has me drooling. I would do anything to see this in theaters.