Why the First Silent Hill Movie is Loved by Fans of the Franchise

While I'm still trying to get over the utter failure of Return to Silent Hill, at least I have the first film, that I can always return to. This was made by the same director who made Return to Silent Hill, (I don't know how he messed up this movie so bad, compared to the first one), and this film feels just like the Silent Hill games that fans love. 

There are quite a couple of differences, but it works so well, due to the pretty good story that we get in the film. It has the same gritty and disturbing feel that the videogames pull off so well, and it works for the fans too. The first two Silent Hill games are combined to create the first Silent Hill movie that was released in 2006, and the combination feels pretty damn accurate to the games.

We follow a young woman named Rose, who adopts a little girl, who is struggling with horrendous nightmares. Rose learns that her daughter is a reincarnation of a girl named Alessa, who was sacrificed by a cult in a town known as Silent Hill. Her death led to the nightmarish creation of Silent Hill, now plagued by monsters who will kill anyone. 

Rose and her daughter are sucked into the town, and Rose's kid goes missing, being discovered by the cult. She vows to hunt down her daughter, determined to rescue her. She teams up with a cop, who helps her fight against several monsters. 

Rose and the cop eventually find the cult, but once they discover that Rose is the mother of Alessa, the cult turns against them, causing death and madness. 

This premise feels like a dark Silent Hill story, and it works so freaking well. But despite these minor differences, the director gave us Silent Hill fans the vision that we wanted. 

1. Pyramid Head, a monster of Silent Hill, belongs to a different story of another character in the franchise, but his inclusion in this movie actually makes sense to the story.

Pyramid Head is one of the monsters in Silent Hill, who is considered to be the guardian of Alessa, who created him after her death at the hands of the cult. Pyramid Head is a massive threat to anyone who crosses his path, and he does not show any mercy, but brutally executing his victims. Once such death that suited his character, was when a random woman was throwing rocks at the mother of Alessa, who was still alive. 

Pyramid Head rips off her skin as punishment, as Rose and her sidekick run away to seek refuge from this beast. 

Pyramid Head is pretty ruthless in the games as well, and I loved how they were able to capture that same feeling with him in the movie. While the games led to fans loving this character, the movie also gave a crazy introduction to other fans who never played the games. 

2. Harry Mason, the father of the girl, was changed into a woman, Rose, for the movie's themes of motherhood.

In the first videogame, the parent that is looking for the daughter is a man named Harry Mason. He relentlessly searches for her, determined to find her and escape from the town. In the movie, we get a mother version of Harry, that is now Rose. This change actually works, because of the main theme that the film was going for toward the end of the movie. 

Alessa's story is pretty tragic, and even though her mother gave her up to the cult to be sacrificed, she still harbored some love for her. During the third act, Alessa returns to the cult with the help of Rose, and she uses her powers to kill off the entire cult, but she spares her mother. Rose is able to save her daughter, and she mentions to Alessa's mother, that she was spared, because she was her mother. 

This works pretty damn well, because there was a reason for this change within the movie's story. It was done with a perfect bow tie at the end of the film, and it was executed pretty well. 

3. The monsters felt like Silent Hill creatures.

While we did get the iconic nurses, several other monsters, and Pyramid Head for the film, we also got a really random monster that actually worked perfectly for the aesthetic of Silent Hill. It was so uncomfortable to watch this scene, because of what the creature represented. In Silent Hill 3, there were very strong implications that some people turned into monsters in Silent Hill, and we get one such monster in the movie. 

The monsters actually represent the psychological damage within the minds of all victims who come to Silent Hill, and this creature in the movie does pertain to one character's backstory. Alessa had a horrific traumatic experience at the hands of a janitor while she was going to school, and as punishment, he was transformed into a monster. 

Rose runs into him during one scene in the bathroom stalls, where Alessa was tortured by him, and she runs away from this creature in fear. The filmmakers understood the significance of what the monsters mean to the franchise of Silent Hill, and this monster was a great example. 

4. The evil of the cult from the games was captured perfectly in the movie.

The cult appears throughout the franchise of Silent Hill in different ways, and every time, we get a taste of how evil these bastards are. The movie does a great job with creating the exact interpretation of how evil this cult is, and they don't hold back on their evil actions. What this cult had done to Alessa in the film was dark as Hell, and the backstory we got was enough for viewers to know that this cult is bad news. 

How the filmmakers were able to capture the evil PERFECTLY with this cult was honestly so impressive. It truly felt like the Silent Hill cult from the games, and the execution was fantastic. Even the leader was done pretty well, and damn, I absolutely loathed her character in the film!

Watching them all die at the end was so satisfying to watch, knowing that they were finally getting their karma at the hands of the child they all tortured.

In my opinion, the director did a fantastic job of bringing to life a proper Silent Hill story, that feels like it belongs in the world of this terrifying franchise!

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Thank you for reading!

Emy Quinn