Silent Hill movie-----your reactions

[Allos]

I have to say I was very pleasantly surprised. I really enjoyed the movie and IMO it's the best game to movie adaptation I've seen. I thought the art direction was very well done, and the few creative liberties taken on the story were small enough to not matter.

Oh yeah...and pyramid head....creepy....

[Sord]

would you recomend to people haven't gotten to play the games? or do you need to play the game to get a better understanding of what is going on?

(don't rub it in, it ticks me off *uses GC as a soccerball*)

[Allos]

I think you'll enjoy a hell of a lot more if you've played the games but it's a decent horror flick if you haven't as well. However, I can say that a minority of people leaving the theater were slightly confused at the end because they hadn't had a better understanding of the story at the end.

See it anyway though.

[Ash1ey]

You may be very lost if you havent played the games.

I just got back fro seeing it and I liked it. I love the Silent Hill series I think the movie captured the look of silent hill absolutley flawlessly. There were a few things that I thought were just dumb and not very Silent Hill, but there is more good then bad.

I really love that they used the music from 1 2 3 and 4's soundtracks. (Some of the songs were redone, and excellently I might add) This is probably the best video game movie, as it stays true to the games to a remarkable extent.

Oh, and the art direction was amazing indeed!

[Outrider]

I thought the movie wasn't too bad. I think the first half of it was excellently done and the second half was rather mediocre.

The art direction was definitely very well done. If you've played the games, I would highly suggest that you go see it. There is so much from the game in the movie. Everything from monster designs to music to camera angles are taken right out of the games.

The movie starts off with great atmosphere but falls into a generic horror flick by the end. Still, for the student price of $5.25 that I paid, I can't complain. Give it a chance if you've got the cash.

[Zem]

I am going to go see it this afternoon. Once I come back I'll post my reaction. Oh, and lucky you Outrider, you only have to pay 5.25, I gotta pay $10!

[RicoRoyal]

Well, I saw it yesterday and I gotta say, I really didn't like the movie.

Really, I didn't hate it but when it came down to seperating the good from the bad, the bad just drowned out most of the good.

On the good side, I thought the town looked pretty damn good. Nice and creepy, especially the school. I really liked the first encounter with pyramid head in the school. I also really wanted to like the story, but like I said, the bad drowned out the good.

The story lost all of its "umph" for me thanks to some really corny, poorly delivered dialoge, as well as some tremendously shitty (in my opinion) pacing. Alot of what came out of Rose's mouth was not neccessary at all. It almost always seemed like she was narrating what she was going to do next or what she thought was going on. Gee, that's great and all... assuming your audience is full of dimwits who can't put one and one together to make two. Same goes for the cop's dialogue, which oftentimes not only seemed like unnecessary narration, but also crossed over the line into annoying-one-liner territory. Oh, and yeah, the overuse of the word "fuck"... classy. The writing was just bad.

Chris's conversations with the detective could have been good if the writers had just stayed a few more hours in the office. Alot of the exchanges seemed like they were between two 13 year-olds. I also think that Kim Coates (portraying the detective) was mostly just there for his check; I didn't believe his character for a second. On top of all that, I thought Sean Bean had a funny accent or something... just didn't sound right to me (comparing him to his previous roles in Goldeneye, Equilibrium and LotR). Either it was that, or maybe he just shouldn't have been playing that role. Something just irked me as wrong.

Bad acting and bleh writting aside, the thing that REALLY made me not like this movie was the pacing of the movie. It starts out alright enough with Sharon about to kill herself and is easy enough to follow for the first half of the movie. Somehow though, everytime after the first time that the screen goes black and we enter the fucked up version of Silent Hill, I found myself thinking "ugh... this again?" It all just felt the same. Real world. Creepy Silent Hill. Fucked up silent Hill. Rinse and repeat. Got more annoying everytime it happend. Truly annoying, however, was the pit stop that the movie decides to take when Rose finally gets to where she's going inside the hospital. I know it was no more than eight or so minutes, but it felt more like 30 minutes of narrated crap. The stuff explained DID need to be explained, but why like that?

Personally, I would have spread all of that backstory portion of the movie throughout other dry parts of the movie. There was a nice hint that the movie was going to go that way with the backstory when Rose comes upon the notebook found inside the desk in one of the classrooms. We get a nice flashback. Short, sweet and to the point. That was pretty much it for that idea though, as we never really get another one of those again until we get it all at once in a huge fucking chunk that truncates the flow of the movie.

I could see myself liking this movie if only more thought had gone into properly executing the ideas behind it. I don't want to go as far as to say that this movie was not entertaining or that it was a complete waste of my time. It wasn't. However, let me perfectly clear that although it is not a waste of one's time to see the movie, it is, in my opinion, a waste of MONEY to see it.

That being said, I actually payed to see Thank you for Smoking (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427944/) and just snuck into Silent Hill. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_wacko.gif

EDIT: Forgot to add that I've never played any of the Silent Hill games. This allowed me to go into the movie without any bias (good or bad). I think that a movie like this needs to be able to stand on its own. Overall, I think it managed to pull it off. I didn't feel lost at any point of the movie... simply frustrated at how the key bits of information were let out with such poor pacing.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: RicoRoyal on 2006-04-22 14:43 ]</font>

[Eihwaz]

I personally really liked it.

It was such a good adaptation of the game, and the artistic changes were understandable. I loved all the little details they kept in: the name of the streets, the layout of the first part of the city, the school...it was all such a good translation.

Pyramid Head was amazing. My friend didn't like how they changed his helmet, but IMO it made him much more menacing. The Great Knife was all kinds of badass, as well. They didn't overuse Pyramid Head, either, which I was glad to see.

The soundtrack was...orgasmic. I kept fanboying out when recognizable tunes from the original OST showed up, stuff like "I'll Kill You", and I'm fairly sure I recognized a few others. The new music was good too. I particularly liked the piece that had a simple combination of piano bits and industrial noise, with a kind of melancholy feel to it. And I totally loved how they used "You're Not Here" AND "Tears of..." in the ending credits. <3

I can definetly see that the movie will probably appeal more to fans of the game, but it's still a very good horror movie. Plenty of good, solid gore.

[shinobu_seta]

The art direction was fantastic. Looked and felt just like the first game. Even a lot of the music was taken directly from the game, that or made to sound exactly like it.

My only problems were with cruddy dialogue. It felt like they were trying to hold your hand too much....like it was trying to appeal to the intelligence level of the average movie goer rather than the actual Silent Hill fans.

Not bad, not bad http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_smile.gif

[AUTO_]

I really haven't played the games on an extensive level (especially the first), so as a stand alone movie I thought it was OK....

As its been said some of the dialogue was just downright terrible...

*jumps to a new building*

"What's in here?"
"I don't know--we're in another building"

Classssy




*SPOILER*!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



















Can someone please tell me what the ending was all about? I'm guessing you would understand if you played the games, or maybe it just went past me, but why couldn't they see Sean Bean, etc?

Was it because they were already dead to begin with? Or damned?

That didn't make any sense to me...


And did the chick take back the evil girl? I said it was going to happen and the way she stared at the camera hinted she did.................but I didn't see the significance of it or why that would even matter if they were already dead or damned or whatever.

[Jarek]

They do have spoiler tags now, though I guess they don't have a button for it.
It's easy though to use.
So I just got back from watching it. Never played any of the games, but I still enjoyed the movie. I agree the music was well done, felt fitting --reminded me of when I played RE4 a bit. Not gonna go into every detail...glad I went and saw it though.
Also, someone please explain the ending (with spoiler tags). D:

Religon and crazy little innocent kids ftw

[RicoRoyal]

Same exact questions/concerns about the end as AUTO_

The way I figure it is that Alessa took Sharon's place towards the end (right when Sharon opens her eyes and sees Alessa walking towards her and Rose). Rose and Alessa were able to leave Silent Hill because as Dahlia said, Alessa is the only one who can open or close the doors to Silent Hill. So basically, Alessa opened the way out of Silent Hill for Rose and herself, but didn't actually get them out of that eerie dimension (covered in fog). Basically, the two of them are stuck with only each other in this whole new foggy version of Earth.

Does something like that happen in the games or am I way off?

Anywho, I kinda like the fact that the story takes these kinds of turns and all... but like I said before, the execution of it is just bad. Cameras take us back outside of house. Scoot on over to the right. Bushes. Yup. Bushes. Waste a few seconds there. End movie. That is one mighty fine weak-sauce ending.

[Jarek]

Hmm...that does seem to make sense RicoRoyal (be it right or wrong).
And lol, you're so right about the bushes. I was waiting for something, anything to happen there. But no, nothing but those bushes. -_-

[Outrider]

Ahem,

Having only played a bit of the Silent Hill games, I can say at the very least that in the first Silent Hill, the whole foggy realm is most likely a separate dimension than the rest of the world. Same with the chainlink fence hell world. Whether or not they go into more detail about the differences in Silent Hill 2-4, I can't help you there.

The odd thing is that I own all of the games, but I've just never gotten around to playing them. That might be my plan for this summer.

[tiltnkirby26]

I liked the movie but it did have its bad points ,but I will say it's better then some other game movies (House of the dead or Mario anyone?)

[Non-Toxic-Crayons]

I thought the ending was very cliche of todays horror movies. Very similar to dark water. Little demon/ghost girl decides to keep the maternal protagonist to herself or whatever I guess thats how they needed to end it, because as I'm told, in the game silent hill 2, Rose has apparently gone missing... So I guess that was there way of trying to explain what happened to Rose through a side story of sorts... Why the little girl decided to keep rose in silent hill, I have no idea...

I really enjoyed the creepiness of some of those monsters.... It's gonna be awhile before I can look at a nurse in the same way... ><
Those baby screaming things were weird as hell too



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Non-Toxic-Crayons on 2006-04-24 23:01 ]</font>

[RoninJoku]

If it weren't for the awkward dialogue and acting, I would have preffered the movie be longer... Something about the execution of the "horror" sequences really chilled my spine... So much more so than common horror movies with their "boo!" moments... Definitely not a good movie for those surprise types of scares. More the type of movie to give you nightmares. Well-me at least...

My biggest beef with the movie however was: OK the evil burn victim girl is brutally smiting the bastard cultists with all the fury of Hell, Ripping them to pieces with barbed-wire... And you are on the edge of your seat (or if you are me, glued to the back) then suddenly!....... Silence

Sooooo anti-climactic... Combined with the rather weak ending after that made the movie end on a rather low note...

Overall, for my entertainment I give the movie an A! For an actual movie critique I give a ... B-

[Alielle]

My impression of this movie improved after the second viewing, but I originally wasn't happy with the changes they made to the storyline and the impetus of some of the characters. Once I wrapped my head around the fact that the movie version of Dahlia and Alessa aren't the same as the game versions, I enjoyed the story for what it was.

The visuals are amazingly well-done, and I echo the sentiment that it's the best VG adaptation that's ever been done. And despite all the wretched on-the-nose dialog, I left the theater trembling with discomfort.

The conclusion felt like the "Bad-" ending. But I kind of admire that they had the guts to not do a cut-and-dried happy version.

[bluelikekurt]

I am a huge fan of the first game. I've played so so into the second one, and the third one I skipped, and I perused the fourth one. I really enjoyed the music, I think it was probably my favorite part. Like everyone said before, the art direction was great, with some of the same images, camera angles, etc.

I think the story had very little to do with Silent Hill, actually. The only characters from the games were Cybil, Alessa, Dahlia, Cheryl *Sharon* and I guess pyramid head and a few of the other enemies. I was kind of unnerved at the amount of people in the town. I think it was kind of an excuse to have more people in the movie or something. I guess where I'm such a big fan of the first one, I really just wanted to see Harry and his goofy butt.

"It's like I was there...but not really.."

[Deathscythealpha]

On 2006-04-22 22:11, RicoRoyal wrote:

The way I figure it is that Alessa took Sharon's place towards the end (right when Sharon opens her eyes and sees Alessa walking towards her and Rose). Rose and Alessa were able to leave Silent Hill because as Dahlia said, Alessa is the only one who can open or close the doors to Silent Hill. So basically, Alessa opened the way out of Silent Hill for Rose and herself, but didn't actually get them out of that eerie dimension (covered in fog). Basically, the two of them are stuck with only each other in this whole new foggy version of Earth.

Does something like that happen in the games or am I way off?



The games normally leave these sort of things ambiguous as well. For the most part we know that there are three worlds; The Real World, Foggy World and The Otherworld (Chainlink fence and rust place). People in the Real World cannot see or interact with those in the foggy world or The Otherworld.

Its not clearly stated what the Foggy World is, but if you go by Silent Hill 2 the Foggy World could be considered purgatory and the characters are trying to redeem themselves for an act they have partaken in. This is why the cultists are stuck in the foggy world, they died and they sinned, but still cant find forgiveness. So we could take it as the girl and her mother died, but the ending has been left quite ambiguous, something i like.

(Hope that made sense. Hate to ramble, but love the Silent Hill series of games and even wrote my Univeristy Disatation on number 2)

Film = Thumbs up in my book. Hit all the major cues for the fans, but could be confusing for those not versed in SH Lore.

[Eihwaz]

And while I do wish some of the dialogue in the film had been dropped, we have to keep in mind that Silent Hill did not have the most astounding dialogue. "Radio. Hm. What's up with that radio?" http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_wacko.gif

[bluelikekurt]

I just want to go ahead and say, that Rose is a character they made up for the movie. I imagine she's taking the place of Harry Mason, from the first game. As far as I know, there is no Rose. In the third game I know there's the girl or whatever, but I didn't play that one.

I didn't really get the ending either. In the game, I guess in the "canon" ending, Cheryl is reborn as an infant and Harry, Cybil and the baby leave. But, like someone said above, the game didn't have a great dialogue or a clear ending either.

[Alielle]

Harry's the best protagonist ever. I love how he practically falls on his face if you step off of a staircase at a bad angle. <3

I can only pray for a UFO Ending in the DVD version of the movie... with a cameo by Harry. "Have you seen a little girl? Short, black hair..."

[SpikeOtacon]

This movie gets two thumbs up from me, and a few extra from those whom I killed for saying 'Nigga Please' every five seconds behind me the first time I saw it.

So nice, I saw it twice.

[Firocket1690]

Heh.

I saw it this past weekend. Loved it. Gory scenes were fucking beautiful. >_>;
Personally, I've never played anything Silent Hill, so I was a bit trailing behind, storyline wise. I went off to wiki a bit of storyline after I got home.

From what I've learned after poking around..
30 years ago, the cultists tried to sacrifice a witch (Alessa) to prevent the apocalypse. The fire failed, and reached the coal mines, and she became disfigured. Sent off to hospital. And since we all know children gain supernatural powers after getting burned, she used her powers to shroud Silent Hill in fog, and create monsters to attack, depending on her mood. She also used her powers to create a pure embodiment, and sent the pure one to an orphanage, which was adopted by Rose.

.. That should answer most questions, considering everybody in this thread already saw the movie.

The only question I still don't know..
When Rose and Sharon went into Silent Hill, it was a ghost town, completly devoid of people. When they first found the church, where were the people fleeing from? The town was initially empty! And if the darkness comes around so much, why bother leaving the church? It just seems tiring, pacing to and fro the church whenever the siren rings.

Oh, and spoilers above.

Sorry for the bump, I saw the movie late. >_>;


Edit: Shit. Pasted the wrong paragraph I was typing in notepad. >_>;

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Firocket1690 on 2006-05-21 14:09 ]</font>

[JKKDARK]

I hate the movies based on video games:(

[RicoRoyal]

On 2006-05-16 14:45, Firocket1690 wrote:
.. That should answer most questions, considering everybody in this thread already saw the movie.



Actually, that answered none of my questions. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_frown.gif

You gave a summary of stuff that was already explained in the movie. I'm surprised you had to go dig up that information considering that the movie clearly took a pit-stop (a very boring one) to essentially just narrate exactly what you wrote (this is when Rose reaches Alessa in the hospital).

In anycase, the whole purgatory thing seems to fit nicely, Deathscythealpha. Adds a nice touch of intricacy to the storyline. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_yes.gif

[Shrevn]

Having only played the first part a LONGGG time ago when the game came out the movie was preety good. It had some nice twists i wasnt specting, aside from that nothing major besides the fact i took my girl to see it with me. Shes a total wimp so she was screaming half the time... im not sure @ what, but then again what can i say lol chicks and horror movies go together hand in hand