Silent Hill Review

By Lee Arcuri

Hollywood has definitely had an effect on my video game preferences. I now seem to only enjoy video games that have no potential for a film adaptation. Games like Pong, or Minesweeper, or even my calculator application on my laptop. Honestly, when Air Hockey: The Movie comes out, you’ll be able to find me taking a nap. In my oven.

Anyway, Silent Hill was just one of the latest Hollywood efforts. Emphasis on “effort.”

This is going to have spoilers, but trust me, there is nothing I could do to spoil this movie that would be worse than what the filmmakers did. But if you are dead set on renting this movie and ruining your day, then don’t read any further. Major spoilers ahead.

For example, Soylent Green is people.

And Silent Hill makes no sense. I mean, seriously, like, no sense at all.

And to prove it, I’m going to walk you through it step by step.

Long story short, this girl named Alessa got burned alive in a town called (wait for it!) Silent Hill. Perhaps you could say she was very upset about this. Her hatred and desire for revenge was so powerful it allowed her to create another dimension. Also, it gave her a lot of barbed wire. More on this later.

This other dimension is sort of an alternate, shadowy Silent Hill. It’s very ashy, too. Ash everywhere. Really, it’s a mess.

Now, the people who burned Alessa alive are trapped in this dimension, and they make their headquarters in a church. Perhaps you could say these people are crazy. Alessa never watched Oprah and does not believe in the power of forgiveness, and so wants to kill them in horrible ways. Unfortunately, she can’t get in the church. Their faith acts as a barrier and keeps them safe.

So, basically, Alessa needs to get into this church somehow so she can complete her revenge against the people who burnt her alive. Everybody got that?

This is all information that is revealed near the end of the movie, where the filmmakers are hoping you will be so relieved at finding out what the heck is going on that you will forget that everything preceding it didn’t make any sense. I’m giving it to you ahead of time so you can see just how crazy this movie is.

So how does Alessa try to get into the church? Well, you see, she can bring anyone she wants to into this dimension, and when a woman named Rose brings her daughter to Silent Hill (the real one), Alessa sucks them both into Silent Hill (the ashy one). Alessa also brings in a biker cop chick, for no real reason other than perhaps she looked hot in leather biker pants. Anyway, Alessa’s plan is to place an aspect of herself (this Creepy Demon Girl) into Rose. Not quite possessing her. Just sort of hitchhiking, in a creepy demonic kind of way. Alessa could not enter the church by herself, but hidden away in a willing host, she could be Trojan Horsed in, if you will allow me to use “Trojan Horse” as a verb. Then, once she pops out of Rose in the church she can exact her horrible revenge.

So far so good.

So, Alessa brings Rose into Ashy Hill, and then easily explains to Rose what her plan is. No, sorry. That was in the version that actually makes sense.

In this version, Alessa sends that creepy girl aspect of herself to communicate. The creepy girl decides the best way to get Rose up to speed is to constantly run away from her. Remember, without Rose, Alessa will never get her revenge. So then the next step in the communication process is to send little babies made of ash after her. This doesn’t work, and for some reason Rose doesn’t understand why she’s been brought to this dimension. Then Alessa sends a full grown Ash Man who can shoot acid out of his face, which he does. This doesn’t work, either.

At this point, Alessa must be really frustrated. Why won’t Rose help her? That’s when Alessa decides to send her best diplomat and emissary of peace and cooperation: A big man with a triangle for a head. Triangle Face Guy calmly attempts to persuade Rose to help them by trying to kill her a lot with a big big big knife.

If none of this gets Rose up to speed, well then surely leaving obscure clues all over the town definitely will. Rose manages to follow these clues and eventually comes face to face with the creepy little girl, who is somehow the same person as Alessa, and also somehow the same person as Rose’s daughter, but let’s not get crazed here with details. Anyway, the creepy little girl can finally tell Rose everything! She can tell her about the plan! She can get her to cooperate!

This is when the creepy little girl bursts into flames. And then, while standing there burning she says to Rose, “I’m on fire.” Thanks for the heads up, Creepy Girl!

Then, the little girl disappears, and Rose STILL hasn’t figured out what’s going on. What an idiot this woman is. How could she not know?

Then Rose finally meets the crazy people who live in the church, and they actually bring Rose inside the church. You will recall, this is exactly what Alessa wanted. But the creepy little girl was too busy setting herself on fire to jump into Rose’s body. Frustrated yet?

Long story short, Rose eventually finds her way to Alessa’s headquarters in a hospital. Because Rose is so vitally important to her plans, Alessa sends some evil nurses with knives to kill her. They fail, and Rose makes it to Alessa in one piece.

Since all else has failed, Alessa breaks down and just finally tells Rose everything.

Why did she wait? Why did she try to kill Rose the whole time before revealing that, wait, actually, just kidding, she needs her?

Nobody will ever freaking know. Not even God knows. Not even Jesus. This would be like watching a Friday the 13th movie where Jason kills everyone, chases the final girl around Crystal Lake, corners her in the barn, and then says, “Hey, I was wondering, can someone give me a ride to the bus station? The Maple Leafs are playing, and I gotta get to the game.”

Get it? That’s a hockey team. It’s like meta-humor or something. Never mind.

So anyway, the creepy little girl aspect of Alessa pops into Rose, Rose goes to the church, Alessa pops out, and (here comes that barbed wire I told you about) kills the crap out of everyone. La de da.

Then thankfully this mind-numbing mess of a movie can be over, and you’ll be free to go take a nap.

In your oven.

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