Kill or be killed

 In Koushun Takami's controversial epic, Japan's youth wages a rebellion against the adults; cutting classes, committing crimes and the like. Threatened, the grown ups decide to pass the Millennium Educational Reform, or Battle Royale Act. The reform basically dictates that a random junior high class will be chosen and kidnapped to be placed in a deserted island. Here, the students are forced to kill each other in front of the whole nation until only one student survives within three days. If they refuse or if more than one still stands after the designated time, bombs attached to their necks go off.

The story takes place in the ruins of North America, then currently known as Panem. The nation consists of twelve districts and one ruling and cruel government residing in the Capitol, basically another district, but much nicer and better-looking than the others. Being the evil dictators that they are, the Capitol forces each of the twelve districts to send two tributes, one boy and one girl, to fight in the Hunger Games, a "fight to the death on live TV." Why? Well, for the sake of entertainment of course. 

A group of teenagers vacationing in a resort find an unlabeled video in their cabin. Curious, they decide to watch it. The video was weird, showing random flashes of a woman combing her hair, the word 'eruption' and a still shot of a well. Thinking nothing of it, they go home only to die at the exact same time after a week. Reiko, a reporter, hears about the death of her niece, one of the teenagers, and decides to investigate, which leads her to watching the video herself. Convinced that she only has a week to live, she contacts her ex husband to help her break the so-called curse. With only hours left before her death, Reiko miraculously manages to stop the chain of deaths caused by Sadako, a disturbed girl who died in a well and concocted the video. However, having watched the copy of the video, her ex hubby dies at the hand of Sadako herself after she climbs out of the TV.

[taken from http://www.best-horror-movies.com/the-ring.html. no infringement intended]

These are just two of the many other productions that America has copied. Seeing as I have a slow Net at the moment, I can't really post and compare them all. However to give you an idea of what the others are, I'll spell some of them out for you.

Word of advise to American film makers, stick to action films. Here, your fancy special effects can work and can be your saving grace in case the plot's bad. Trust me, the horror flicks you copy off of Japanese maestros would still pretty much suck even if your effects are better than theirs.