Always watchable Mitchell makes the most of a creepy yet plodding video game concoction

Rating: 6/10 (24 April 2006)

SILENT HILL (2006) ** Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean, Jodelle Ferland, Laurie Holden, Deborah Kara Unger, Kim Coates, Alice Krige. Weird, creepy and at times plodding yet never dull adaptation of said video game about a young woman (the always watchable Mitchell) trying to help her daughter's (Ferland) plague of bad dreams leading her to the titular ghost town cursed with a secular cult, damned creatures and a never-ending snow fall of hell ash. Sexy Holden is a stand-out as a tough yet compassionate motor-cycle cop who teams up with Mitchell to find her missing daughter. French filmmaker Christophe Gans (who co-wrote the dense script with Roger Avary and Nicolas Boukhrief) has an eye for the sordid surreal ugliness that the film embraces yet allows the CGI production design to overtake the underlining theme of a parent's love that outweighs the price of evil.