Ambitious yet heavily flawed adaptation

Rating: 6/10 (10 April 2020)

"Silent Hill" is a 2006 horror film and video game adaptation directed by Christophe Gans starring Radha Mitchell and Sean Bean. After not having watched a film yesterday and posting a faux review I decided on kicking of my birth month with a rewatch of what many deem to be the best video game adaptation. Given that this film is far away from being a masterpiece and is still a mediocre film doesn't really say much positive about this apparently cursed sub-genre. I actually have mixed feelings about it. First of all, I played the original PlayStation game and consider it to be an extremely chilling experience even it just rode on the coattails of the "Resident Evil" game franchise, which I personally adore (but still have to check out the reportedly terrible film adaptations though). Anyways, I expected an equally nightmarish film, but as I said, mixed feelings. The film obviously altered the main premise and has thrown together countless elements into what appears to be a mish-mash of all the original games. That's where the mess begins. While it was Harry Mason solely looking for his daughter Cheryl in the abandoned town of Silent Hill and uncovers one shocking truth after another, it's now Rose Da Silva looking for her daughter Sharon. Similar plot, other people. It's such a pity, as I thought that Bean would make a great life action Harry Mason, only to find out that he played an all new and on the other hand useless background character. The film rather establishes a philosophy about maternal bonds and how important this relationship is, what is anything but terrible and not even that disastrous, but I'm generally not a fan of extreme changes when it come to adapting a source material appropriately. The story of the film may of course vary, but at least keep the same protagonists I connected to while playing the game in the first place. Is this too much asked for? While the film doesn't ensure this, they at least did something else properly: The optics. The overall ash covered scenery and burned and abandoned buildings, as well as the nightmare sequences of the other world are definitely some important advantage this film has to offer. I mean, they even nailed this one famous shot and the general camera work isn't nothing to sneeze at either, the same applying to the fitting score, but if there's one thing that bugs me about the visuals it's the usage of effects. Some practical effects and CGI effects were decent, but well, some seemed to have come straight out of a PS1 game and I'm pretty sure that didn't happen intentionally. They fulfilled their use to a certain degree, but considering it's a mid 2000s film it's pretty cheap to see it done only like this. Now about that plot. Oh boy, what an enjoyable mess. It sloppily combines the best elements the original franchise has to offer and makes an abomination out of it. The first half follows the story of the original game step by step and slowly begins to establish a similar atmosphere, but as soon as other people enter the scene and the film focusses on the cult theme the film stopped being scary. The cult might have been used in the game as well, I know that, but what made it so chilling was how it was only subtly used. Seriously, from there on it might be gross or shocking, but it's far from the eerie and emotional hellride the original game used to be. The game sent you on a psychological and melancholic journey, your only friend being a radio and a crowbar - a lonely man on the search for his daughter. No other people, except for one or two faces. The change of focus therefore basically steals the whole vehemence of the film and is anything but scary. No, really. It didn't scare me anymore. What's even more frustrating is how it implies some of the games finest features (the radio/mobile phone that signifies an upcoming threat, the siren etc.), but leaves it underused eventually. The most immense disappointment is the appearance of The Pyramid Head. He's only there for commercial reasons, at most an excuse for the producers that they have included one of the fan favourite villains. Sadly, he's totally irrelevant for the plot, the characters and doesn't do much at all. He's the personal demon of James Sunderland. What role does he play here? Sigh. Oh, now that we're speaking of uselessness: The male characters and the Christopher sub plot are also not adding anything important to the story and are absolutely unnecessary. Almost seems like they were written into the movie just to have male actors featured ... wait, they were? Yes, indeed and that's another thing that made me facepalm. Without or without them, the story continues on the same mediocre level and doesn't really add something overly exciting. In the end, it only reveals all the secrets and explains the whole story in a single scene and shows of some gory but not scary effects. Oh, and don't get me started about that senseless ambiguous ending. All of this is so frustrating to witness, because it's far from what the original stayed for. Back then it became such a success for it's strange atmosphere, emotional depth, nightmarish visuals and deliberately unexplained and confusing plot. Some hints are given away from time to time, but it's never meant to be fully understood, because Silent Hill is a personal and subjective hell. It's extremely depressing, creepy and absolutely melancholic. What does this movie do? It offers a half-heartedly produced mishmash of generic genre tropes and labels it Silent Hill. All in all, this film is a heavily flawed adaptation that had so many chances to become this infernal journey, but ends up as nothing but an entertaining yet cheap mess with dozens of plot holes. It might be shocking at times and has at least a decent atmosphere, but it's so far away from being the devastating mystery the game is. It could have been if it had respected its source material more. A scarily wasted opportunity to become the greatest video game adaptation of all time ... wait, for a time it has been. Even with everything I stated before. Is it a great film? Absolutely no. Is it a perfect adaptation? Also no. Is it the closest to a decent game adaptation we can get? Sadly, I think so and it's still impossible for me to hate it nevertheless. That's where I give this film credit for: Mindless entertainment.