HORROR MOVIES 101

Silent Hill

Okay.  So if you have been keeping up on the "Exorcist" post, you will know that I'm not a very deep person as I stated in my last posting.  As such, I have trouble seeing the "metaphors" in film and literature and even music.  For instance, in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, there is a rose bush in front of the jail.  To me, that rose bush is just that:  a damn rose bush.  But, apparently, it's supposed to be several million other things, also.  And I can't seem to SEE that without someone saying, "Hey, doofus.  It also means..." or the like.

With that said, Silent Hill was a pretty good movie.  The game, though, is FULL of metaphors and how-de-doos and the plot is VERY complicated.  Things are not what they seem and the game leaves the gamer sitting and wondering, "Now wait...was that that thing or was she this or something...what the hell?!"  However, I don't think the movie conveyed this very well and it was pretty straight-forward.  But, I've read a lot of the synopses for the games so I knew what was happening. 

Anybody else have a view on this dealy here?

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Dr_Gor:

    Actually, I never knew this was a video game!   And, I have never seen the movie!   I would LIKE to!    I have seen some previews and I think I read something in Fango and I thought it looked quite promising...   I am sure I will stumble across it one of these days...

Ok.  Since I really REALLY love you, I can forgive you for not knowing this was a video game first.  The movie is (loosely) based on the first game, but there are changes made such as the main character is a woman and not a man.  And the woman is married.  In the game, Harry is a widower. 

Something interesting about the games, as well as several other survial-horror games, is the ability for the player to get different "endings."  I think in the first game there are 5 which is pretty cool since you have to do different things to get them...  Ok my nerdiness has shown it's dorky head and I am getting off track here.

The whole point of this particular post was to ask if you dears would like me to give you a little background on the games and try to explain some things, especially the ending of the movie.  I don't want to ruin anything, though, so perhaps you should watch the movie first (and fast!) so that I can get this out of my system.

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I'm Back!  And, after recently watching Silent Hill, I think I will go ahead and spill the beans.

In the video game, it is all about Good vs. Evil and Light vs. Dark.  Hence, there are two "different" Silent Hills:  Light and Dark.  Dark Silent Hill rolls around usually someone evil is around.  This is more true with the first and third SH than the second one.  Silent Hill was a small town that got trapped in between itself when the townspeople discovered a substance known as "White Claudia".  You can probably guess that it's a drug of some sort.  And then I think everything went down hill from there.  Dahlia, the town "Elder", I guess you could call her, starts summoning demons and what not and then ends up with Alessa, who is supposed to be a little demon baby, so the townspeople burn her to death.  But (and I'm not sure about this) I think that the trauma causes Alessa's spirit to break into two parts, one being "Evil" and the other being "Good".  The "Good" spirit is rescued by someone, the nurse I think, and taken to Harry's doorstep where she is raised and named Cheryl.  Eventually, Harry takes Cheryl to Silent Hill for a relaxing vacation.  On the way, someone(thing?) runs into the road and causes Harry to crash the car.  Harry gets knocked unconscious.  When he wakes up, Cheryl is gone.  From then on, the story gets more twisted (and confusing).  Turns out Dahlia's in line with a demon by the name of Samael who lives inside Alessa.  And now she needs Cheryl to complete two halves of Alessa's spirit and "give birth" to Samael in the flesh.  I can't really explain any one particular ending because, depending on how you play the game, you get a different ending.  The "good" ending though involves every bad guy dying, but the Alessa/Cheryl combination dies too.  However, out of this chaos is born a new child who Harry and Cybil, the policewoman who helps him throughout the game, take with them and raise.  And THAT'S just the FIRST game.

I'll be back...

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Silent Hill was a bloody (ahem) messed up movie, but that's what made it enjoyable: its cryptic twistedness, bizarre creatures, wicked gore and heavily brooding, oppressive atmosphere.  The ending was infinitely "huuuuuuhhhh?" but I figured since I wasn't familiar with the fact that it was a game until after I saw it, I wrote off my lack of comprehension as an artifact of not being familiar with the game.  The end sequence is wild and that song is out there...*hums its feverish electric vibe to himself*

If you're into deep gore, drag your bones over to http://www.bloodgutsandgore.com.  Please ignore the image difficulties and the lack of updating in about six months (as of 8/8/07) as things have been...interesting and varied over here, plus my connection is such that even accessing my own site now takes eons.  I will, rest assured, have superior equipment (satellite internet anyone?) and be able to post the last dozen updates and be back to "normal."  ;)

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