A pinch of fog, a sprinkling of darkness, and dash of blood equals the start of a new age for video game films

Rating: 8/10 (23 April 2006)

As a fan of the Silent Hill video games, I have been waiting for a movie adaptation of the game Silent Hill for about 5 years. Mind you this was before the movies Resident Evil/Alone in the Dark and the absolutely hysterically bad House of the Dead came out. As more and more video game adaptations slipped their way into theaters over the last few years, some how they became progressively worse. Then by some random site, I heard news of a Silent Hill game being produced by one, Christophe Gans who made a movie I thoroughly enjoyed, "Le Pacte De Loupes". So I thought to myself, this has to be the one movie that will prove that video games can be translated to the big screen and Mr. Gans would have the perfect vision to guide his team of skilled professionals which included "Pulp Fiction" writer Rogar Avary and creature creator Patrick Tatopoulos. So I went yesterday to the theater with some friends of mine and this is what I came out with.
Silent Hill kept me on the edge of my seat, kept me interested, and blew me away in some instances. Let's start with the thing the Gans team did right. Gans nailed the atmosphere of Silent Hill. Everything was perfectly placed, and looked like it was straight out of the game. From the multiple stores, to the odd enemies, to the eerie and sometimes beautiful score by game composer Akira Yamaoka. I was immersed in the atmosphere of the movie, from every time Rose took a step into a new area, to when the nightmare world came to fruition. Also, the Gans team made the right move and made Silent Hill and R rated affair. I was extremely happy to see plenty of blood and disturbing imagery throughout the film. The most impressive thing about the violence in Silent Hill is that its not too cheesy but more on the side of squeamish. The blood isn't firetruck red but albeit a pale red, almost sad if you will. A final thing that I was impressed with is the story. Yes, it can be confusing to the casual movie-goer, but the story pretty much takes the first game's plot and twists it just enough.
*********SPOILER***********
In the first Silent Hill game, Dhalia was the main evil antagonist to the main protagonist (Harry, which in the movie is played by Rose). In the game, Dhalia was the leader of a cult who was trying to bring a demon god named Samael back to life using Alessa and Cheryl(Sharon in the movie). In the movie, the "fanatics" are just stuck in the 1600's and try to rid witches by burning them at the stake. This fanatic group was headed by Chritobella, not Dhalia. Dhalia is such a neutral character in the film which really surprised me because I had so much disdain for the character through the first Silent Hill game. Also the final battle in the first game is against Samael (the merging of Alessa and Cheryl). In the movie, the final extreme death scene is just the burnt Alessa from hell getting her revenge. Quite Different you see.
*******SPOILER END***********
Some things were definitely wrong with the film as well. For example,the sequence of events leading up to discovering Silent Hill was poorly done. It seemed like Gans just wanted to throw together a bunch of random scenes involving no reason for the audience to care about the characters. Another thing that was done poorly in Silent Hill was the pacing in the film. Don't get me wrong, I didn't feel the movie was long, I just felt that having Sean Bean's story in there was pretty pointless and frustrating. His story intertwine's with Rose's, taking the audience out of the adrenaline pumped atmosphere of Silent Hill to Mr. Bean's frantic search for his wife.
Silent Hill was a success in the end. It provided me with a reason to have faith in video game adaptations. It's about time too because a whole new slew of bound to be horrible video game films are about to be released on "quick fix" America. Directors and producers should take a cue from Silent Hill and the Gans team. There is hope in the future for this genre of movies and Silent Hill just took the first step in that direction.