what a steaming pile of turd!

Rating: 2/10 (24 April 2006)

before i decided to see Silent Hill my expectations were low and my god were they reaffirmed. i haven't played any silent hill games and don't have the urge to after seeing this film either. the first sign of anything supernatural in this film was that of crazy little green thing stumbling its way towards the Rose Da Silva character screaming a horrible high pitched scream, this was mirrored by the screams of Rhada Mitchell(who isn't a bad actress, watch "man on fire") which seemed to be her instruction for the entirety of the movie. the action was cliché and repetitive with at least 40% of the film, her running about in a horrified daze. the dialogue was sub standard and could have been written by a 11 year old, with the characters having no depth and seemingly no sense what so ever. all that the Cybil Bennett character can say is "what the f**k is this", "oh f**k", "f**k, f**k, f**k" all the way through out the movie. the blatant plot lines and necessary moments of stupidity were grating on the mind at the best of times. Rose Da Silvas unfounded moments of reassurance toward her daughter were laughable. towards the end of the film when we thought it was all over, moans were heard when it appeared that we were wrong and there was more to come. i could hardly class the film as scary, as the loudest scream was for a trailer before the movie. i feel the Sean bean was dealt a rough card when he accepted the role as Christopher Da Silva, his role was simply there to add plot depth and was completely trivial within the context of the film. one of the worst and rushed moments in the film was when he is enquiring on the phone for "the records for silent hill...the police records" in order to fulfil his characters duties in the film. he breaks into a record office and stumbles upon a room with scorched, damp boxes, when he see the first box he comes to labelled "Silent Hill Police Records". the lack of effort and time put into the subplots of this film were sometimes hard to watch. the score was OK and it could of been better perhaps taking tips from the recent "the hills have eyes" having a deeper, percussion focused score that drilled into your very heart. i am a fan of the silent hill sound-bite though, which reminds me of an abandoned Italian gangster town. Also the cgi aspect of the film including the wide pan shots of the town looked very fake. and there were many continuity flaws in the film including the scene where PH thrust his sword through the metal door and swings it side to side, then pulling out and leaving a round hole.perhaps one of the saving graces for this film was the make-up department, with all of the characters that were real people having great prosthetic features as well as those who had the removal of facial features as well. don't get me wrong i think that the talent on hand for this film within the actors could have made a great film. but with a poor screenplay and poorer script, this film didn't really have a chance (apart from with hardcore game and genre fans who don't really know a good film when they see one anyway). all in all this was perhaps the worst film i have seen for a long time full of cliché and rubbish action with a diabolical ending which left loose ends and a sense of emptiness