The Silent Hill franchise has been suffering in silence for around a decade now, and it's making a grand return to both games and film. The sudden outpouring of support for a property that felt genuinely dead so recently can be shocking, but there are still elements worth looking back at with concern.
Of all the things announced in Konami's Silent Hill Transmission, the new movie from the director of the 2006 original is one of the most surprising. The director spoke at length about his previous effort and the upcoming film's relationship to it, but he left the other Silent Hill film unmentioned, for good reason.
When Christophe Gans directed the 2006 Silent Hill film adaptation, it was one of the best video game movies to date. Since a few entries in that genre have managed to be genuinely good films, it isn't as fondly remembered as it should be, but it's a strong horror film. Gans is a hardcore fan of the game series, and he worked with Konami for five years to get the rights. After relative success with his first outing, Konami and Sony made it clear that a sequel was in progress with both Gans and screenwriter Roger Avary attached. Unfortunately, Avary went to jail on a vehicular manslaughter charge and Gans was cut from the project. Without the director that loved the source material so much and with a studio trying desperately to appeal to a wider audience, Silent Hill: Revelation went on to be one of the worst horror films ever made.
By all accounts, the fault for this disastrous adaptation lies squarely with the studio. Producer Don Carmody, who also produced hits like The Boondock Saints and the entire Resident Evil film franchise, insisted that the first film was just too focused on pleasing fans. This movie was meant to be more accessible. Logically, one would assume that trying to broaden the film's appeal would result in a more straightforward horror experience. Something with fewer callbacks that lives or dies on its own merit. Revelation instead decided to bet the farm on a terrible 3D gimmick, remove every aspect of psychological horror, and turn the franchise into a mess of jump scares and lazy cameos. Director M. J. Bassett has been clear that she didn't want the film to go the way it did, but her concerns were largely ignored by the team that brought the world Resident Evil: Retribution.
Silent Hill: Revelation is an extremely loose adaptation of Silent Hill 3, though only the costume design and character names give that information away. The first film was a loose adaptation of the first game, so it makes sense as a direction for the franchise, but it also ruins everything good about a fantastic game. The story follows Heather Mason, who travels to Silent Hill to investigate her mysterious past and learn the dark secrets it holds. Unfortunately, the town itself has been robbed of its typical haunting presence and grim atmosphere. Instead, it's depicted here as a carnival haunted house in which monsters jump out and yell to wow the audience with the 3D effects. The script fails to find the humanity in characters that were so well-realized in their source material. The plot of the game has been hacked to pieces and inexpertly sewn together like many of the franchise's monsters. Above all else, it's plainly not scary. The film functions exclusively as a slapstick comedy, and in that realm, it's fairly solid.
Critics and audiences were vicious to Silent Hill: Revelation. The film has a whopping 10% on Rotten Tomatoes, and the best anyone seems prepared to say about it is that it was blessedly short. Every accomplishment the film earns is quickly undone by its defining gimmicks. Bassett clearly has some love for the source material as well, but every time her directorial voice shines through, it's swiftly interrupted by another jump scare. Beyond ruining the plot and the characters, the real crime of Silent Hill: Revelation is that it simply can't capture the spirit of the games. It's one of the best examples of what can go wrong with video game movies available today.
When Christophe Gans appeared on the Silent Hill Transmission, he wisely omitted Revelation from the record. Interestingly, he refers to his upcoming Return to Silent Hill as a reboot. Given that the film is an adaptation of the beloved Silent Hill 2, there's really only one thing that a reboot could be erasing. Unfortunately for Bassett and everyone who worked on Silent Hill: Revelation, the game is better off being forgotten. Over a decade later, fans can look back at this film and laugh, but hopefully, the studios that allowed it to be created have learned their lesson and can do better next time.