[Freya-dæg] Shocktober Pt.3:Making some Noise about Silent House

{Silent House's movie poster, found on Wikipedia.}

Introduction
Plot Summary
The Good
The Bad
Judgment
Closing

Introduction

Based on Gustavo Hernández's independent horror film, Casa de Muda, this week's movie is a chilling one.

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Plot Summary

Sarah (Elizabeth Olsen), her father (Adam Trese), and her uncle Peter (Eric Sheffer Stevens) have returned to their old vacation house to prepare it for sale. But, if working in a big, old house isn't bad enough, there are stories of people who have been squatting in this vacation home while Sarah and her family have been away.

What's more, Sarah hears things as she works her way through sorting old possessions. Her father and her uncle say it's just an old house, but Sarah's ears aren't the only thing deceiving her when she begins to see people who, on second glance, appear not to be there at all.

When faced with strange stories, noises only you seem to hear, and things that only you can see what could be worse than a Silent House?

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The Good

The overlooked indie horror movie of 2012, Silent House, has quite a bit to offer.

Much like The Screaming Skull it shows its mastery of atmosphere early on, but rather than pumping up the tension to the point where our patience bursts and we wind up with something comedic rather than horrific, Silent House knows how to moderate its tension. In that regard, this movie is to The Screaming Skull as Edison's DC electrical system is to Tesla's AC system.

Helping to maintain this atmosphere is ace camera work by Igor Martinovic. His handling of angles and long shots is not only effective but convincing when it comes to showing us what perspective we're seeing everything through. Much of the movie is shot so that Sarah is the focus, and paired with the single camera approach, this is a dynamite movie for cinematography. In fact, it should definitely be looked at as a reference for communicating perspective through film.

{Throughout most of the movie the camera focuses on Sarah; putting Peter in front of her fantastically expresses his protective role.}

Of course, the bread and butter of any horror movie couldn't be moderated by cinematography alone. The movie's script and direction are also great at stringing out just enough frights throughout the movie to release excess tension and to make way for more.

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The Bad

However. Silent House's strengths are met by its major flaws.

As an experiment in what I'd consider first person film, we aren't given the same information that we'd get if we had different character perspectives or even a script that allowed for omniscient (or near omniscient) story telling/filmography. Because we lack the sort of information that could only be delivered explicitly if we were privy to another character's perspective, we're given an ending that is a shock, but not in an expected way.

At the risk of spoiling the ending - here I go - rather than a final moment that sends shivers up and down your spine (as Paranormal Activity did for me), we get something softer, more akin to the ending of Shutter Island, or Inception even.

It's not a bad ending in and of itself, but it's not what's expected from a horror movie, especially one that tries so hard to combine jump scares with more psychological frights. Ultimately, however, the movie's attempt to balance these two makes it much more lopsided.

It also doesn't help that one of the actors simply has a presence that suggests his/her involvement in some unsavoury activities.

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Judgment

Silent House is a sleek, and considerable horror/thriller.

It makes effective use of camera work to tell its story and to create atmosphere.

It withholds a little too much information, and its ending suggests that the next scene could be more interesting than everything that came before it.

This movie's a strange beast because it's really quite a strange movie when considered. Much like Shutter Island it plays with perspectives, and there are twists throughout, but the thing is that despite its admirable attempt to be a story told mostly in the first person, what's lost as a result leaves us to piece far too much together.

This challenge that Silent House presents is a welcome one, and can make for an engaging movie experience, but it's not engaging if you're not willing to do some speculating throughout your watching of it.

Nonetheless, it still offers some chilling scares and an ending that, as far as soft, conversation-generating endings go, is better than Inception's. And for that, as well as Igor Martinovic's masterful work behind the movie's single camera, this is one to save, I say, Freya.

So swoop low and lift this one from the muck and mire - it's a movie to be seen and to be talked about for what it does right as much as what it loses in trying to do too much.

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Closing

Check back here tomorrow for Annotated Links #22!

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