October Horror Movie Marathon

[Demoncrat]

Originally Posted by MacBlayne

Silent Hill: Revelation

Oh, no. Oh, no! OH, NO!

If Silent Hill was the equivalent of a beautiful flower, then Silent Hill: Revelation is the wormy manure underneath. Loosely based on the third game, Michael J. Bassett’s film (Christophe Gans presumably got tired of studio meddling and bailed) sees Sharon (Adelaide Clemens) all grown-up and heading to Silent Hill to find out her mysterious past. And then stuff happens. And more stuff happens. And then Malcolm McDowell shows up. And other stuff starts happening.

This film is a disgrace. Nobody will ever accuse Gans’ film of being a classic, but at least it was a film trying its very best. It was loaded with disturbing visuals and was captured by deliberately unwieldly camera in order to heighten the dread. Bassett, however, choses to film his atrocities in a very boring manner. The visuals are as pathetic as the monsters. Gans had charred infants and bugs with disturbing humanoid features populating his vision of Hell. Bassett has “creepy” clowns and people with their faces sewn up to scare the audience. It even transforms the infamous Pyramid Head, the nightmarish murderous rapist from Silent Hill 2, into a cuddly hero figure.

Silent Hill: Revelation is a calamity. An abysmal wreck. I don’t know what happened to Bassett here (he previously did the rather gorgeous Solomon Kane), but he delivered a train-wreck with this film. The only things going for it is Clemens' performance (she actually bothered to deliver one – more than what can be said of Kit Harrington), the soundtrack by Akira Yamaoka, and a rather well designed monster that can be best described as a spider made of mannequins. But even with its short running time, all this is not enough to redeem the film.

Avoid like the plague!

Actually enjoyed it up to the point where Mr Ubiquitous turns up, then it swan dives spectacularly

[platostotal]

The games of Silent Hill are much better than the films (no surprise there)

the first (PS1) has a nice Stephen King vibe to it, the second (PS2) didn't quite match the first but looked much nicer, the first film is okay but lacks the atmosphere of the games, passed on the sequel.

For tonight's ABUKtober...

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by platostotal

I watched that last night. My favourite of all the sequels i think. I reviewed it last year so there's no point doing so again.

[MacBlayne]

Originally Posted by platostotal

The games of Silent Hill are much better than the films (no surprise there)

the first (PS1) has a nice Stephen King vibe to it, the second (PS2) didn't quite match the first but looked much nicer

1 and 3 are the scariest. 4 is the creepiest. But Silent Hill 2 is my favourite (and it ranks as my all-time favourite piece of literature). The story is absolutely devastating, and hits hard due to it's realistic premise (a depressed man dealing with the aftermath of his wife's death from cancer). It destroyed me and it still haunts me. I don't think the real Hell will come close to the one in Silent Hill 2.

[trebor8273]

Just the one viewing tonight.

[trebor8273]

Salem's lot.

One of the most atmospheric and scary TV series ever made, hell till this day the scenes with the child vampire outside the window still give me a chill till this day. I couldn't sleep for a week when I first saw it as a kid. One of the best adaptation s of kings work and one of Hooper's best films up there with chainsaw. 9.2/10




Edit

Now to decide what to watch for tomorrow

Gates of hell trilogy

Dr phibes movies

[MuckyFunster]

Any of you lot at the GFT Glasgow tonight for the Halloween screening?


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[Demdike@Cult Labs]

The Ninth Gate (1999)

Johnny Depp is in my opinion one of the finest actors currently working out of Hollywood. It can be argued that his star has fallen somewhat thanks to numerous films with Tim Burton and the critical if not financial maulings his later Pirates of the Caribbean movies took although last years Black Mass showcased his acting chops making him a critics darling once again.

It's easy to forget that at the turn of the century Depp was taking challenging and also genre roles that people such as me immediately took to as he shook off his earlier teen dream tag in films like Donnie Brasco (1997), Fear and Loathing in Last Vegas (1998), Blow (2001) and the interesting horror triumvirate of Sleepy Hollow (1999), From Hell (2001) and yes, The Ninth Gate.

I love The Ninth Gate. I find it totally engrossing. Roman Polanski is a director with a long and loved career. From Repulsion (1965) to Rosemary's Baby (1968) and Chinatown (1974) to The Pianist (2002), he's a director with a back catalogue of classic film making, but i think The Ninth Gate is his masterpiece.

It's a film that is superbly paced, the viewer is drawn in and gripped from the opening seconds and Polanski never lets go throughout all 133 minutes of it's run time. The music by Wojciech Kilar is outstanding as is the cinematography and indeed all the technical aspects, not to mention a terrific support cast including Emmanuelle Seigner and a seductive Lena Headey.

The story about a rare book dealer (Depp) who is employed for a lot of money by a billionaire collector (Frank Langella) to authenticate his copy of The Nine Gates of the Kingdom of Shadows, a book that was written in 1666 by the pen of Lucifer himself, and there are only three copies in existence. The quest takes Depp from New York to Portugal and on to Paris as he uncovers more disturbing secrets about the book.

It might help that i love books and i also love Occult movies and The Ninth Gate uses both ideas to make an outstanding psychological horror film. In fact Polanski's use of the Devil is ingenious. Similar in pace to say Chinatown except with a tremendous performance by Depp instead of Jack Nicholson, the film becomes creepier and more chilling as the secrets of the book and it's connections to the Devil unfold. Polanski gets the film under your skin in a way modern horror (The Witch aside) never comes close to doing and it proves all the better for it.

The Ninth Gate probably gets classed as one of both Roman Polanski and Johnny Depp's lesser films but to me both are at the very top of their game and The Ninth Gate is outstanding.

[J Harker]

I've only seen The Ninth Gate the once a few years back but thoroughly enjoyed it. Despite being knackered and about 2 in the morning (never a good time to put an intelligent two hour film on) I was completely gripped the whole way. I'll have to pick up a copy and give it a rewatch.

[MacBlayne]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

The Ninth Gate (1999)

Haven't seen this in years but I remember being thoroughly impressed with it. It starts off like a silly horror mystery, but gradually gets more and more unnerving. It's obvious from watching it that Polanski took the material rather seriously, and chose to put the viewer through a similar journey as Depp. I wonder if this is why many American critics took a dislike to it - that it became a straight-up horror rather than a faux satire of the genre.

Great review!