Everything a fan or horror fanatic could wish for!

Rating: 7/10 (7 May 2006)

The guy who directed it, hasn't lied about his devotion to the games. Everything he put in the movie, will be recognisable for silent Hill-fans in one way or another. Of course changes have been made, of course it still shows its video game roots now and then, in the negative sense of the word. But when it all comes down to it, this movie will be at the very least enjoyable for Silent Hill-fans and horror fans who are unfamiliar with the source material.
In my opinion, Silent Hill is the very first game-movie done right. There have been quite a few game-movies over the years, but they never ascended beyond the level of "fairly amusing", and I think that none of them stayed to true enough to the source material, while they should have. Christophe Gans, the director of this movie, stayed true to the source material in almost every way, and yet he also knew how to alter it just enough to make it interesting for a good horror movie.
The atmosphere of the Silnet Hill-games has always been the most important thing to me, you really felt alone most of the time and creeped out by what this ghost town had to offer. The movie provides the same experience, because the town has been recreated for the movie, based on the looks of the games. That's marvelous. The same fog is there, the darkness, the nightmare world. It's all there, even the sirens. I loved it.
And then there are the monsters. thankfully, it wasn't all CGI, puppetry was also used and humans in suits. It worked incredibly well, but the CGI too looks amazing. I didn't know whether I should cheer or scream when a familiar Silent Hill-creature showed up. It was great to see them without having to worry about them coming after me, but on the other hand they were every bit as scary as they were in the game. Except Pyramid Head, he was every bit as AWESOME as he was in Silent Hill 2. You see? You CAN have an iconic game villain in a movie without having him looks stupid(looks at Nemesis in RE: Apocalypse). I was very satisfied with the appearance of the SH-creatures in this film. They didn't always act like they were "supposed" to act, but it was all for the good of the movie.
I read a lot of criticism about the acting in this movie. Well, I've seen much worse in other horror movies, I can tell you that. the main character was good in her desperate search for her daughter, she really reminded me of poor Harry Mason in the original SH-game. And then there was Cybil, also from the original game. The woman who played her was pretty good, she was as tough as I had expected Sybil to be. the girl who played a demon and the daughter of the main character, wasn't too bad at all. She received the most criticism, but I think she's quite good. There was one line that made me cringe at the beginning, but that was it. Especially as a demon kid I liked her acting. Sean Bean was a pretty worthless addition to the story, but at the very end of the movie, you'll see why he had to be in the movie. I won't spoil the ending. You may like it or you may hate it, but I loved it as heck. It was a perfect Silent Hill-ending.
Now for the worst part of the movie, and that is sadly the story and the dialogue. I have to agree with others I've seen making comments on this movie, that the movie clearly shows its gaming roots. Sometimes a character would say something so damn obvious, that it felt like some B-movie. As a whole, this movie is definitely no B-movie. Also the times that characters seemed to know exactly where they had to look for clues, was very much like the game. Coincidences happen more than once in this movie, it all look very linear like the games. The character are 'driven' by an unknown force towards the ending, that is very clear. Gans did exaggerate the coincidental nature of the games in this movie. Changing the purpose the mysterious clan from the original Silent Hill-game wasn't really a good change for me. Until the finale came up, and I realized it was perfect after all.
Finally, I want to make comments on the sounds and the music. From the very beginning I was creeped out by the terrible sounds that the monsters make, and the terrible sounds of the nightmare world. There is a good use of the source material's music in this movie, not ever out of place like so many people say. I didn't think that Gans went too far in this case. Sure, the games were silent a lot of times, but that's no reason to make it like that in the movie. Gans put a lot of music from the games in the movie, and it doesn't feel like fan-service only. the music fits, and it's awesome music at that.
Final Judgement: Gans did a wonderful job on creating the typical Silent Hill atmosphere in a two-hour movie. The images, the creatures, the sounds and the town in both of its versions are in there, and they couldn't have been better. the acting is very decent, unlike what some would want you to believe. The dialogue isn't too good, but the same goes for the games very often. That's no excuse for the movie of course. The story and its changes to the original game's story bothered me at first, but it all fit in at the end. This movie is the perfect fan service, a wonderful movie for the true horror fan and the best game-movie ever.