Stupid, unintentionally funny, but still enjoyable

Rating: 5/10 (31 August 2006)

Upon being in a basement in my friend's house at midnight, I was forced to watch a horror flick loosely based on a video game. I had never heard of "Silent Hill". I am not a fan of horror, but this film gave me a whole new perspective of what horror is about.
Although I simply do not scared easily, the element of fear in the beginning was so tight that I was almost freaking out while the movie unraveled. A lady named Rose is bringing her daughter, Sharon, who needs to be institutionalized, to a haunted area named Silent Hill, the place of her orphanage. She is supposedly drawing disturbing images on the way there without recollection of drawing them at all, while at the same time, a cop is "stalking" them.
Once Rose arrives in Silent Hill, things changed for me. It was eerie bright, and Sharon was lost. As she follows her daughter, things go dark and creatures begin attacking her. This is where I believe the element of fear was now lost, as my friend and I laughed at the creatures. Things were pretty confusing, especially when the armless man popped out and dead janitors and bugs. Why this is all happening was not clear to me, but kept me interested. As I watched, things seemed to be slowly unraveling, as the cop and Rose team up to find Sharon and escape the monsters of Silent Hill.
Once Rose, the cop, and a new cast member Anna enter a church in which the monsters cannot habitate, the movie seemed to slowly transfer from horror to action/drama. For me, this is where I lost the movie and the potential it had seemed to go to waste. Christians that spoke in poetic literature said that Rose and the cop needed faith of God to destroy the demon that held her daughter captive. I being a die-hard Christian, was delighted that Christianity was playing a role in horror. However, I was in for a huge disappointment.
The moment the leader of the church saw Sharon's picture, she yelled "Witch!" and starts attacking with her "electricians" and "principals" for no apparent reason. The cop tells Rose to go on alone while she takes care of the church members. The element of fear was back, but the movie was still confusing. As the movie unraveled, certain things made sense, but the story was extremely complex and I can still not understand due to the fact there were some plot holes the size of craters.
I don't want to spoil the film for you, but I will tell you that the movie lacks intelligence and some of its potential is laid to waste. They mock Christianity by making them "witchunters", and the creatures there are outright hilarious, and I couldn't help myself from laughing except for one scene of creatures that freaked me out. There is also some unnecessary language that occurs randomly, and there are some extremely disturbing images, such as people getting ripped to shreds.
Not to say the film had its good points. For some strange reason I was enjoying myself, and the action was fantastic. I also liked the music, but other than that, most of the movie just played out its lack of intelligence and wasted most of the potential it had. Overall, I found it a fun film. It gave me a new respect for horror in some ways. 5.4/10