A Gruesome Descent into Hell....

Rating: 10/10 (15 July 2006)

Being a huge fan of the games, I watched Silent Hill on opening night. And honestly, I've never been so torn about a movie. Part of me loved it-- The part that understood the ashen and rusted beauty and intricacy of the film. The other part of me knew that the casual viewer wouldn't like this film. This is made for the fans of the game. Or at least for fans of the survival horror genre.
Gah, how to describe it all. First off, this movie just revolves on video game logic. The dialogue is cheesy, the actions are incomprehensible, and in the middle of a scene, a person just says a piece of unnecessary explanatory dialogue. As another reviewer said, the dialogue falls into either unnatural exposition or instructional. This was obviously done on purpose to recreate the feel of the game, since Roger Avary (a co-writer of Pulp Fiction) is highly capable of writing normal dialogue. The main character automatically knows that if she gets a key to a certain area, she must get to that area to move the story along. There is even a moment when a level is beat, the screen goes white, and a voice says, "Congratulations" followed by a cut-scene. This is as loyal to a video game as humanly possible. This will either make you hate the movie with a passion or adore it. I myself enjoyed it.
Another very interesting touch is that when Rose is running down a hall, the camera quickly switches angles just like in a survival horror video game. (You know, those frustrating moments when the camera angle switches and you find yourself walking into the exact same room you walked out of? Especially annoying when some terrifying creature is in that room.) Oh, and when she's memorizing the map, she keeps saying Left, Right, Left, Left, etc., and someone told me that that's actually a code in the game. I thought that was an interesting touch. Long story short, this movie is as accurate to the game as possible.
And the beauty of the film-- Wow. Just... gorgeous in that screwed up way. The creatures are stuff nightmares are made of. They're vicious and symbolic, meant to get under your skin and creep you out. Its rare that you'll see creatures like this in another film or outside of Silent Hill. Their movements and appearance represent something, though its not used as intricately as it is in the game. And when that siren sounds... A sense of dread sweeps over the audience. You know you're going to descend into even more of a nightmare, the next dimension of hell. There has never been such an ominous sound as that siren. The descent into that hell dimension is gorgeously done. The ash that permanently descends on Silent Hill melts into darkness, then the screen dimly lights up to reveal the walls rusting and melting apart. It's beautifully disgusting.
Oh, and the music, which is taken almost entirely from the video games is at its best here. Akira Yamaoka, the composer, uses these grinding, threatening sounds to make your skin crawl. When the monstrous Pyramid Head appears, the music rises to a grating groan that beats into your head and makes you feel like you shouldn't be there; That it is wrong to be in that room. The games created that effect perfectly.
But then comes the plot. This plot is utterly incomprehensible for those who haven't played the game. Not only that, but it's convoluted. For the first half of the film, nothing happens. Then all the explanation occurs in the next half, and it still doesn't make any sense. Don't get me wrong. This movie isn't supposed to lay everything out for you. Silent Hill is a place filled with clues that make you piece them together into something vaguely comprehensible. If they explained everything in this movie, I would've been very disappointed. The warped world of Silent Hill isn't for those who are out for a quick and gory horror film. It's something to reflect on, to sink into your dreams at night. However, I felt as though some things could've been delivered slightly better in the grand scheme of things. The film drags in some parts, and at a little over two hours, its too long.
This film is not for those that haven't played a survival horror game nor for those who cant appreciate a survival horror game. Its that simple. Christopher Gans set out to make a game FOR the fans-- Screw what the rest of the world thinks, and he did it well. No other director would be that loyal. I'm not going to give this film a rating, since it'll mean different things to different people. 95% the moviegoers are going to despise this film. The rest, who can understand what he was trying to accomplish will love it. Its that simple.