Directed by:
Christophe GansScreenplay:
Roger AvaryCinematography:
Dan LaustsenCast:
Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean, Jodelle Ferland, Kim Coates, Deborah Kara Unger, Alice Krige, Nicky Guadagni, Laurie Holden, Roberto Campanella, Stephen R. Hart (more)VOD (3)
Plots(1)
The eerie and deserted ghost town of Silent Hill draws a young mother desperate to find a cure for her only child's illness. Unable to accept the doctor's diagnosis that her daughter should be permanently institutionalized for psychiatric care, Rose flees with her child, heading for the abandoned town in search of answers -- and ignoring the protests of her husband. It's soon clear this place is unlike anywhere she's ever been. It's smothered by fog, inhabited by a variety of strange beings and periodically overcome by a living "darkness" that literally transforms everything it touches. As Rose begins to learn the history of the strange town, she realizes that her daughter is just a pawn in a larger game. (official distributor synopsis)
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Reviews (10)
I'm not a fan of computer games, I didn't like Resident Evil, and I couldn't even adapt in the two hours after passing the Welcome to Silent Hill sign. It’s obvious that the film has been handled by the most competent people in the field and its technical aspect in particular is great and scary, not to mention the oppressive atmosphere brought by the dead city covered with falling ashes. But nothing about this film as horror can make up for a bunch of holes in the story (which I still wouldn't have minded) or my purely personal problem, namely that I couldn't find my way to it and even dozed off slightly at one point (although it might have been because I was fresh out of a graduation party). Either way, this, which in many people's opinion is the best adaptation of a computer game, didn't impress me much and I don't see any reason to revisit it.
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I hadn't played the video game, but I had high expectations before the movie, followed by somewhat conflicting reactions, so I was appropriately excited. The result was pleasantly surprising. In horror movies, the atmosphere is extremely important and Silent Hill is an example of a film that stands or falls with a well-established atmosphere. The depressive environment of a destroyed city, where ash constantly falls to the ground and black smoke rolls, accompanied by the wailing sound of a siren, dark shadows appearing, and people's faces covered with gas masks all serve to evoke a feeling of claustrophobia, and dark premonition. As it is well known, people are most afraid of the unknown, and the film is logically strongest in its first third when evil still has an abstract form. If the director didn't try to explain anything, my final impression could be 100%. The twist itself didn't impress me, but fortunately, it was not decisive for the result. In its category, Silent Hill has had no competition in the past two years. Overall impression: 75%.
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In audiovisual terms - excellent. Almost everything from the book was included here, although that is paradoxically the biggest negative about it, because this way Silent Hill the movie seems just like another part of the game where, however, there is no opportunity for interaction - we move from level to level up until the finale. Literally like watching somebody playing one of the episodes of “Silent Hill" the game. The screenplay isn’t one of the strongest ever written, but it works for this picture and the ending fits exceptionally well with the overall mood. The actors are also well-chosen and even the little girl is bearable. Overall this is more of an unusual experience than an actually good movie. If nothing else, Christophe Gans proved that movies based on games don’t necessarily have to be C-movies, but can even be B-movie standard.
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In Silent Hill, Christophe Gans didn’t set off down a path to a regular horror movie and at the beginning it turns in the direction of a psychological drama about a mother and her adoptive daughter and only later shows us hell in the real sense. At last somebody has given up on traditional (dumb) frights and Silent Hill relies on the bizarreness of deformed people - creatures (the walking...um, acid-spitting blob, Pyramid Head and the nurses). But the main thing this movie has is ATMOSPHERE in block letters and in bold. And in addition we are given a chillingly intelligent story (especially the very end will resound in your head long after) and excellent acting performances (particularly Radha Mitchell is breathtaking). I hope that the horror genre turns more this direction in the future, because this movie had me pinned to my seat with fear and sometimes I was using just one eye to watch, ostensibly using the other to read the subtitles. And that’s what horrors are meant to be.
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Visually, it's absolutely amazing, and whether it's Pyramid Head, Alessa, or any other revelation, I just envy what Christophe Gans presents to the viewer with a stunning piano accompaniment. Unfortunately, as someone who didn't play the original video game, I got quite lost and ended up completely lost at the end. If I hadn't looked up a lot of things, I probably still wouldn't know whether or not I even liked Silent Hill. After understanding the main connections, it's a bit far-fetched, but I give it four stars considering the atmosphere. It should have continued immediately the following year in this atmosphere and not turned the suspicious town of fog into a cheap horror brand.
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