The Rope Curse 4: Kuntilanak (2026)

The Rope Curse 4: Kuntilanak – Expanding the Franchise Across Borders

With The Rope Curse 4: Kuntilanak, director Liao Shih-han attempts the franchise’s most ambitious swing yet: grafting Indonesian folklore onto the established Taiwanese universe. The premise — a livestreamed exorcism gone wrong awakens the Kuntilanak, a vengeful female spirit from Malay/Indonesian myth, triggering a curse that jumps from Jakarta to Taipei — is undeniably hooky. It also reflects a savvy commercial instinct: cross-border horror is having a moment, and the Kuntilanak legend offers fresh iconography beyond the franchise’s familiar rope-bound ghosts.

Direction and Cross-Cultural Horror

Liao returns after helming earlier entries, so he knows the series’ grammar: slow-dread set pieces, practical-effect-heavy apparitions, and a willingness to let silence do the heavy lifting. The challenge here is tonal cohesion. Indonesian horror (think Impetigore or Satan’s Slaves) often leans into visceral, mythic dread, while The Rope Curse films have favored procedural mystery laced with family trauma. Writers Kao Ming-sheng and Huang Chih-kai must bridge those registers without diluting either. The marketing synopsis suggests a structure that splits time between Taiwan and Indonesia; if the edit juggles those threads clumsily, the film risks feeling like two movies stitched together. Early festival buzz (where available) has been mixed on this front — some praise the cultural specificity, others note pacing drag in the Taiwan-half setup.

Cast and Supernatural Stakes

The ensemble is a genuine strength. Taiwanese veterans Chen Bo-zheng and Vera Chen Hsueh-chen (as Yu-Lan) anchor the emotional core, while Indonesian actors Ferry Salim, Audi Marissa, Fandy Christian, and Dito Darmawan bring lived-in authenticity to the Jakarta sequences. Hsu An-chih and Hangee Liu carry the younger generation’s arc. Crucially, the film avoids the trap of treating the Indonesian cast as exotic backdrop; the synopsis positions the curse as genuinely transnational, with the son’s journey to return ashes serving as narrative bridge. Whether the script gives these performers material beyond reactive terror remains the open question. Horror sequels often reduce characters to death-order fodder; the franchise’s best moments have come when it invests in grief as a haunting mechanism.

Early Verdict: For Franchise Faithful and Folklore Curious

Without a finished cut to assess, any rating is provisional. The ingredients — a director who knows the sandbox, a compelling mythological collision, and a cast that spans two horror-rich cinemas — suggest a floor of competent genre fare and a ceiling of franchise-best. The risk is overreach: too much lore, too many locations, too many new rules. If you’ve followed the series, the curiosity factor alone warrants a watch. If you’re new, this entry’s standalone accessibility is unproven. Approach with tempered expectations and an appetite for subtitle-heavy, folklore-dense horror.