Friends discover a digital phenomenon in which spirits are taking over the world through the internet, blurring the line between life and death.

Most of us lived during the emergence of the internet, our lives revolutionized by the ways we learned, communicated, and socialized. As a teen, the early days of the internet provided a space for me to catfish as Mandy Moore to unsuspecting fans in chat rooms. But soon the horrors of technology revealed themselves to me when I forgot to delete “hairy muscle men” in my search history. It was pop ups, I swear!

Techno horror is a brand of the genre that explores fears of the systems and gadgets that dominate our daily lives. PULSE (2001) aka KAIRO was released amid the J-horror craze of the late 90s/2000s alongside sensational mainstream Japanese hits turned American remakes like The Ring, and The Grudge. PULSE had its own way-to-late remake that unsurprisingly betrayed the atmosphere and scares of its Japanese predecessor. Not even pop star Christina Milian could save it.

The film follows two parallel plot lines set during the same catastrophic event. A group of Tokyo plant shop employees are shaken by the suicide of a coworker since he continues to appear on their screens pleading for help. In the second half, an economics student finds disturbing ghostly images relentlessly invading his ISP and imparts the help of a friend to flee Tokyo as an epidemic of lonely spirits take over. 

This film conjures an atmosphere of dread and loneliness and features some of the scariest portrayals of ghosts on film. PULSE is one of my bona fides, a very scary, very sad movie that will always live on the tip of my tongue when chatting horror.