Overrated by moviegoers, underrated by critics

Rating: 6/10 (23 October 2006)

Critiques of this movie are all over the board, but most are polarized: Critics hate it, moviegoers love it. The reception probably suits it. The fact is that the movie has ups and downs, and it happens that the ups are very good and the downs are laughably bad.
The bad news: The story and dialogue are insufferable. The director and writer claim to have met the challenge of translating an already vague video game plot so that non-gamers can understand it. They failed miserably. The movie's storyline is even less coherent than the game's. The biggest mistake is probably that after two hours of confusion, the movie comes to a full stop and the audience is forced to sit through a catch up scene in which the entire story is laid out all at once. The violence is entertaining, but seems over the top and out of place considering the Silent Hill games are always more subtly eerie than overtly gruesome. Overall the acting is bad; the lines are B movie material; Sean Bean's role in the movie is pointless and distracting; and although the plot centers around an evangelical Christian-like cult of holier-than-thou witch hunters, the movie wastes its opportunity to tap into Americans' current fears of religious fundamentalism or to make any meaningful social commentary.
The good news: The movie looks fantastic. Few people want to sit through a movie whose only merit is its special effects, but in Silent Hill's case the effects, environments and creatures are so excellent and intriguing they become the movie and truly overshadow its weaknesses. The movie is at its best when nobody is talking, when we simply follow the lead character Rose as she wanders aimlessly through an endless nightmare, like Alice in a dark and twisted version of Wonderland. As stated above the social commentary falls flat, but if you look hard enough, there are some nice underlying themes centered on both the dangers of blind faith, and of giving in to revenge. The story feels like it would have had more promise in the hands of another writer, and perhaps could be elaborated on in a sequel. The director is up to the challenge of being faithful to the look and feel of the game in every detail, right down to the perfect recreation of scenes and camera angles from the games.
Some critics have compared Silent Hill to an Uwe Boll film, and that is beyond unfair. This movie is not great, it isn't the amazingly successful video game adaption fan boys have been wishing for; but nor is it terrible by any means. In short, the director and art department deserve medals, while the writer deserves to meet his doom at the hands of a vengeful Pyramid Head. Depending on whether you can forgive a terrible script in favor of marveling at some truly amazing visuals, you may either love this movie or hate it - or join the tiny, elite, third group of moviegoers who recognize the movie has strengths and weaknesses that make it average out to, well, average.