Silent Hill Movie--SPOILER WARNING!
Look, it's Heather! If you don't want the movie spoiled don't read below Heather! Thanks for your patience and cooperation.
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I was pissed when I first heard that they were planning to change the plot of the first game. My view on this is that you should either remain completely faithful to the game, or else make up an entirely new plot. It's important to the integrity of the game that the characters are the same, since they're the ones you grow to care about. It's also important that it's a father-daughter relationship.
I was almost willing to overlook this slight fact because part of the thing that's cool about the first game is that you never really know what happened, and to put it on screen would be to take away that mystery. Then again the nature of a movie based on something that's already cool in another format is that generally speaking, something gets fucked up (the one noteworthy exception I can think of off the top of my head is Sin City), regardless, so this excuse is tenuous at best. But I was almost willing to give it to them. I'm glad they changed the symbol for reasons I won't elaborate on here. It's the only thing I'm glad they changed.
The Good: The music! In the theater I was totally fangirling out with Chris over the music. And the atmosphere! And how some of the camera angles even were the same. Over this I almost had a fangasm. Also the scene where Rose goes in the bathroom and there's this thing and it says "Dare you dare you double dare you!" with an arrow pointed to the thing's mouth. This part felt so very authentic to me. I also loved the way you'd see Christopher in Normal and then Rose in Other/Hell, and how they extended this to the ending. The ending was beautiful and very true to the game.
The Bad: I'm not sure what was with that whole monologue scene, it seemed really cheesy and sad, and some things like "I'm burning!" seemed too trite and overdone, too cheesy-horror-movie. For those who've complained about Cybil dying, I'd argue that her death itself, though not the way she died, is canon--after all, there is an option in the game where she can die. Granted, it didn't happen that way, but she can die if you let her.
The Ugly: Dahlia. Dahlia Cannot be a Good Guy. Can. Not. The. End.
Overall I was really happy with the first half of the movie but felt like they dropped the ball in the second half. Though the ending was really nice and felt authentic. I wasn't happy when Rose didn't die when being accosted by the children things (and where were their famous knives?); it felt like the makers wanted it to "make sense" but the whole point of the game is that it's not SUPPOSED to "make sense". You're SUPPOSED to die and then be like "What the bloody fuck??!! I just died, why am I still alive?" I feel like they were guilty of this with Dahlia as well. It doesn't "make sense" for a mother to do that to her child. Well, that is kind of the point of the game, people--you're supposed to be shocked and horrified that Dahlia, a mother, would do this to her own, biological daughter--while Harry, a male, a father, is going to all this trouble for a little girl who isn't even biologically his. It sends a message about what family REALLY is and how things aren't always as they seem, and the movie seemed to pervert this message by watering down the whole Dahlia thing. I felt like a few other things were watered down as well. It didn't seem to be entirely cohesive either. I wish the whole thing had been as steeped in atmosphere as the first parts were, and more mystery too. So I'm not ENTIRELY pissed off, because what they got right, they did beautifully... but they did fuck up a few very important things, so just as before I even saw the movie, I have mixed feelings.
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I was pissed when I first heard that they were planning to change the plot of the first game. My view on this is that you should either remain completely faithful to the game, or else make up an entirely new plot. It's important to the integrity of the game that the characters are the same, since they're the ones you grow to care about. It's also important that it's a father-daughter relationship.
I was almost willing to overlook this slight fact because part of the thing that's cool about the first game is that you never really know what happened, and to put it on screen would be to take away that mystery. Then again the nature of a movie based on something that's already cool in another format is that generally speaking, something gets fucked up (the one noteworthy exception I can think of off the top of my head is Sin City), regardless, so this excuse is tenuous at best. But I was almost willing to give it to them. I'm glad they changed the symbol for reasons I won't elaborate on here. It's the only thing I'm glad they changed.
The Good: The music! In the theater I was totally fangirling out with Chris over the music. And the atmosphere! And how some of the camera angles even were the same. Over this I almost had a fangasm. Also the scene where Rose goes in the bathroom and there's this thing and it says "Dare you dare you double dare you!" with an arrow pointed to the thing's mouth. This part felt so very authentic to me. I also loved the way you'd see Christopher in Normal and then Rose in Other/Hell, and how they extended this to the ending. The ending was beautiful and very true to the game.
The Bad: I'm not sure what was with that whole monologue scene, it seemed really cheesy and sad, and some things like "I'm burning!" seemed too trite and overdone, too cheesy-horror-movie. For those who've complained about Cybil dying, I'd argue that her death itself, though not the way she died, is canon--after all, there is an option in the game where she can die. Granted, it didn't happen that way, but she can die if you let her.
The Ugly: Dahlia. Dahlia Cannot be a Good Guy. Can. Not. The. End.
Overall I was really happy with the first half of the movie but felt like they dropped the ball in the second half. Though the ending was really nice and felt authentic. I wasn't happy when Rose didn't die when being accosted by the children things (and where were their famous knives?); it felt like the makers wanted it to "make sense" but the whole point of the game is that it's not SUPPOSED to "make sense". You're SUPPOSED to die and then be like "What the bloody fuck??!! I just died, why am I still alive?" I feel like they were guilty of this with Dahlia as well. It doesn't "make sense" for a mother to do that to her child. Well, that is kind of the point of the game, people--you're supposed to be shocked and horrified that Dahlia, a mother, would do this to her own, biological daughter--while Harry, a male, a father, is going to all this trouble for a little girl who isn't even biologically his. It sends a message about what family REALLY is and how things aren't always as they seem, and the movie seemed to pervert this message by watering down the whole Dahlia thing. I felt like a few other things were watered down as well. It didn't seem to be entirely cohesive either. I wish the whole thing had been as steeped in atmosphere as the first parts were, and more mystery too. So I'm not ENTIRELY pissed off, because what they got right, they did beautifully... but they did fuck up a few very important things, so just as before I even saw the movie, I have mixed feelings.