The Gist
A man’s journey to find his missing girlfriend takes him to dark place from the past.
The Review
In 2006 we saw the release of Silent Hill – a film based on a horror themed video game that had a legion of fans. While the reviews of the film were lukewarm the film quickly became a cult favourite and to this day is still listed on a lot of ‘Must See’ horror lists.
Like was so often the case in the early 2000s a sequel was quickly put into production but something happened behind the scenes and director Christophe Gans exited the project. Eventually it was released under the title Silent Hill: Revelation with a different filmmaking team behind it. The film wasn’t well received and the Silent Hill franchise seemed to have been put to bed.
But now it has re-spawned with a new film and once again Gans has returned to the fold with the latest film in the franchise Return To Silent Hill. But don’t worry if you haven’t seen the previous films because this one is a stand-alone film that is loosely based on the Silent Hill 2 video game.
The film opens with young artist James Sunderland (Jeremy Irvine – War Horse) almost running over Mary Crane (Hannah Emily Anderson – X:Men – Dark Phoenix) while she waits for a bus high on a cliff top above her home town, Silent Hill.
He goes to help her and the chemistry between them is instant. A relationship starts and then years later James finds himself apart from her but finds a letter from Mary asking him to come back and find her.
He travels back to Silent Hill and discovers that it is very different place. It looks like an apocalypse has happened. Ash falls from the sky nearly constantly while mutated creatures walk through the streets. Humans are scarce and the ones he does come across seem both physically and mentally damaged.
Still James continues to search for Mary but there are also many questions that need to be answered. Who is the mysterious psychiatrist, known only as M (Nicola Alexis – Dune: Prophecy), who constantly tells James that Mary is dead, and how does the mysterious cult from Jame’s memories of Mary factor into her disappearance.
Whether you love or hate Return To Silent Hill is going to come down to how you feel about films that are a ‘little different’. While most will look at the film and think that it will be a piece of commercial pulp style wise it takes on all the artistic traits of an European arthouse film as Gans lets the audience explore this decimated city just as James is.
As the plot slowly meanders on with very little dialogue in patches and we are introduced to a myriad of creatures and mutants that now call Silent Hill home you could be excused for thinking you are watching an art installation or that Christophe Gans is auditioning to start directing black metal band’s video clips.
While that style might confuse and alienate some of the audience is does match with the game play of the original video game. I do have to admit though that the film itself does seem to work better during its flash-backs and really only comes to life during the present day scenes with the introduction of Maria as a character.
Still the boring parts of the film are largely over-shadowed by the audience’s curiosity. Once you begin this journey with James you will find that you want to stick with it to the end. You simply must have the answers to the all the questions and to the credit while it is done in a roundabout way every question is answered and I must admit the film’s ending is fairly fulfilling.
The various creatures that are revealed in Silent Hill are also amazingly creative but it does feel that they are never fully utilised throughout the film – to the point that I don’t think I ever felt like they posed a threat to James as well.
What does hold up throughout the film though is the performance of Jeremy Irvine. He basically carries this film from start to finish with a performance that actually makes him one of the most memorable things about the film. At times he has to portray his emotions to the audience without dialogue and he does that with ease – something that would have been made harder by the fact that most of the time he would have been reacting to a green screen.
The Verdict
Some may feel that Return To Silent Hill just looks like a creepy screensaver while others may choose to embrace the films artistic side. Either way I get the feeling this will become a cult classic that is very likely to divide audiences over its merit.
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