The Mortuary Assistant, Based on the Horror Video Game

Rebecca Owens isn’t exactly a people person, but nobody actually wants to do business with River Fields Mortuary (or any of their competitors), so it should be a good fit. The problem is all the demons possessing the dead. Her boss, Raymond Delver never mentioned that during his training program. Unfortunately, she is in for a rough night of on-the-job learning in Jeremiah Kipp’s The Mortuary Assistant, based on Brian Clarke’s video game, which opens this Friday in theaters.

The embalming and cremating are not a problem for Owens. The exorcisms will be trickier. Delver never mentioned that part of the job. However, on her first busy night working alone, a parasitic demon lurking inside one of the bodies senses her emotional baggage makes her ripe for possession. Much to her annoyance, Delver clearly expected something like this to happen. At least he has procedures in place—assuming she can trust her eyes and ears—which she can’t.

Movies based on video games probably have the worst critical reputation of any cinematic genre. Yet, weirdly, films derived from survival horror games tend to be positive outliers, as exemplified buy the original Five Nights at Freddy’s and the Taiwanese Detention, perhaps because they have clearly established characters and storylines to build upon. In this case, the screenplay, co-written by Clarke (the game designer) and Tracee Beebe, also hews quite faithfully to the video game narrative.

Kipp does a nice job building tension from the creepy, claustrophobic location and the infernal franchise lore. The two co-leads also far exceed the expectations resulting from the film’s gaming source material. Willa Holland (whom Arrowverse fans know as Thea Queen) is credibly neurotic as Owens, while still suggesting she has sufficient fortitude to survive (at least potentially).

Return to Silent Hill: The Third Film, Based on the Second Game

The Konami videogames never explicitly identified Silent Hill’s state, but it was generally understood to be somewhere in New England, even though it was inspired by the real-life ghost town, Centralia, PA, which was evacuated due to toxic coal mines fires that continue smoldering decades later. However, the first two films located the nefarious burg in West Virginia. Now, the third installment geographically shifts the ominous town to Maine, more in keeping with game lore. Regardless, Silent Hill is a nice place to be from—far from. Nevertheless, James Sunderland revisits his late wife's hometown after several years away, when he receives a mysterious letter from her in Christophe Gans’s Return to Silent Hill, which opens today in theaters.

Presumably, Mary Crane died during the environmental disaster that devastated Silent Hill, but the details were sketchy, so Sunderland still holds out hope. Of course, the letter’s inexplicable arrival clearly suggests a sinister force is luring the grieving artist into Silent Hill’s supernatural peril.

Obviously, this is not the picturesque Silent Hill Sunderland remembers. The air is now foul and cloudy, while monsters roam the ruins, definitely including Pyramid Head, who has been slightly redesigned since the previous two films. Yet, we can tell from flashbacks, evil always lurked below the surface in Silent Hill. That was especially true of the sinister cult founded by Crane’s father, who acted like they had been evicted from the Dakota Building (a.k.a. The Bramford in Rosemary’s Baby).

Naturally, Sunderland eventually finds his way to the Silent Hill hospital, because faceless nurses are an iconic element of the games. Along the way, he encounters Maria, a human survivor, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Crane, except she carries herself in a much more provocative manner. Indeed, she seems torn between helping and seducing Sunderland.

Return to Silent Hill is set in the same cinematic world as the first two films, but it adapts the storyline of the second game release—relatively faithfully. Unfortunately, the most notable deviations devised by Gans and co-screenwriters Sandra Vo-Anh and Will Schneider are uniformly bad, because they dispel the mood and kill the tension. Arguably, the new bits might even undermine franchise mythology, depending how viewers interpret them.

It is strange Gans took such a misstep, because has always maintained a good rep with fans for his understanding of and enthusiasm for the franchise. Indeed, Return does a lot of things right from the perspective of the fanbase, especially the score penned by Akira Yamaoka, the longtime composer for the games. Loyalists will likely also appreciate seeing Evie Templeton reprise her role as Laura, the strange street waif who somehow survived the town’s horrors, from the recent remake of Silent Hill 2, the game (not the movie).

Until Dawn: The Latest Film Based on a Survival Horror Video Game

Larry Fessenden digs wendigos. He wrote and directed Wendigo and The Last Winter, featuring a sort of metaphorical wendigo. He and Graham Reznick also the long, branching story that unfolded in the popular horror-survival video game Until Dawn, which included wendigo content. The Twin Peaks-y “world” of the popular PlayStation game has been adapted for the big screen, but the narrative and characters are completely different in David F. Sandberg’s Until Dawn, which opens tomorrow in theaters.

In the game, Josh Washington lost two twin sisters. Clover only lost one, but Melanie’s disappearance really launched her on a downward spiral. As the film opens, Clover and her friends are on the last leg of a road-trip retracing Melanie’s last known whereabouts. It has been a super-fun trip for everyone, especially for Abel, her bestie Nina’s new boyfriend. No closure appears imminent, despite the rituals conducted by her supposedly physic friend Megan. However, just as they prepare to pack it all in, the strange guy at the gas station suggests they check out Glore Valley, the place where all the missing people seem to vanish.

Off they go, right into a time-loop, which sounds like a major departure from the game. Regardless, it is a surprisingly sinister macguffin. If they live past the crack of dawn, they break the cycle. However, this is not Groundhog Day. Each night, they are killed in a different manner, by a new bogeyman, so it is impossible anticipate the danger or correct past mistakes. Somehow, the evil force tormenting them is connected to the freak 1952 catastrophe that destroyed the mining town that suddenly appears around them. Presumably, the mystery man, Dr. Hill, is also involved, since he clearly comes and goes as he pleases.

Sandberg’s film could be highly divisive among fans of the game, since it tells a radically different story. However, open-minded horror fans should appreciate its original take on time-loop terror. The screenplay co-written by Gary Dauberman (who also directed the recent Salem’s Lot remake) and Blair Butler is surprisingly clever. They torment the heck out of those dumb kids, while keeping the audience guessing. There is also some nifty design work, particularly in the eerie “visitors’ center,” where each nightly nightmare begins.

Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Featuirng the Voice of Keanu Reeves

Sonic is so fast, he outran Covid, grossing almost $150 million domestic (over $300 million worldwide) on a mid-February 2020 opening. Of course, his tail was cut somewhat short due to theater closures, but the sequel made even more money. Running is what Sonic does best, but he struggles with tasks that require quiet subtlety, or as his fans would say, the boring stuff. With the second film, Sega fans got even more of what they want and the trend continues in Jeff Fowler’s Sonic the Hedgehog 3, which opens this Friday in theaters.

Sonic is a big blue talking alien hedgehog who came to Earth in the first film after his guardian was tragically killed. In the second film, Sonic met his constant companions, Miles Prower a sensitive fox and Knuckles, a pugilistic echidna. Their longtime nemesis remains Dr. Ivo Robotnik, a.k.a. Eggman, but the former government scientist turned supervillain has lately fallen on hard times.

Apparently, another evil genius re-purposed Robotnik’s special drones to attack G.U.N., the Men-in-Black like agency (but with proper uniforms) that handles aliens like Sonic—and frees Shadow the Hedgehog, Sonic’s evil equivalent, from his cryogenic prison. Perhaps Sonic and Robotnik will forge a temporary alias to save the world from Shadow, or perhaps not.

Sonic’s whole deal is his speed, so Fowler duly delivers scene after scene of his fleet footwork. It might be true to the character and the games, but for non-fans, the repetition grows dull. Fortunately, the new film also brings back James Marsden and Tika Sumpter as Tom and Maddie Wachowski, because they have surprisingly endearing chemistry together and help supply the human touch the film needs more of.

Admittedly, Idris Elba’s gruff voice-overs as Knuckles are so consistently amusing, it is easy to see why his character starred in the spin-off streaming series. Likewise, Keanu Reeves growls with Method-level intensity as Shadow, having reportedly done his Sonic homework. On the other hand, Ben Schwartz might have the right tone for Sonic according to what fans expect, but adults unfamiliar with the franchise will be underwhelmed by his brashly juvenile-sounding portrayal of Sonic. Yet, he remains palatable.

On the other hand, a little of Jim Carrey, as Robotnik (and in a not-so-secret dual role), goes a long, long, long way. Seriously, Carrey piles shtick on top of shtick, while mugging and pratfalling like both his face and bones are made out of rubber. It quickly grows tiresome.

Max Beyond: You Can Watch the Movie Before Playing the Game

It is time again to "live, die, repeat." However, unlike in The Edge of Tomorrow, each time you die, a little of you maybe dies for real—in all of the you’s. Of course, the one that dies is definitely dead. Max Walker is a little boy with the ability to shift between dimensions. In each one, his ex-Marine step-brother Leon tries to rescue him from an evil cyberpunk corporation. Unfortunately, in every dimension, Walker’s captors manage to stay one step ahead of the rescue attempts in Hasraf “HaZ” Dulull’s animated feature Max Beyond, which releases tomorrow on digital VOD.

It is no accident the first third of Max Beyond feels like a video game. It was developed concurrently with an upcoming game. For prospective gamers, the feature serves as an introduction to the world. For viewers, we get to see Leon Walker blow dozens of Axion guards to smithereens before the company’s super mecha enforcer invariably kills him. Of course, the robotic killer is getting inside information from Ava Johnson, Max’s “doctor” (and a dead-ringer for Sarah Palin), who has him record all his “dreams” in a journal, so she can study them and anticipate his brother’s attacks.

Each time his brother is killed, Walker “resets,” jumping into a new dimension. It looks like each reset produces a cataclysmic explosion that anyone living in his current dimension ought to want to avoid. However, the various Ava Johnsons appear to be playing a collective long-game. Each reset clearly weakens Walker. She also starts to notice a cumulative ill-effect on Leon too. In fact, Max is looking so bad, she starts to have a change of heart, but she remains beholden to her evil multinational corporate masters.

There are a lot of repetitive action sequences in Max Beyond and even more questionable motivation. A good 80% of what happens in the film seems poorly thought-out. It is a shame, because when it finally starts to seriously address its multiverse business, Dulull and co-writers Paula Crickard and Stavros Pamballis have some fresh ideas to offer, particularly the personal linkage between dimensions.

Five Nights at Freddy’s, from Blumhouse and the Henson Creature Shop

Gen X fondly remembers video arcade pizzerias like Chuck E. Cheese (still in business) and Showbix Pizza (sadly not), so of course we now enjoy packaging our nostalgia in horror movies. Logically, it is not the pizza or the video games that will kill you. It is the animatronic rock & roll stage show animals. Based on Scott Cawthon’s popular horror survival video game (that predates the similarly themed Nic Cage movie), Emma Tammi’s Blumhouse-produced Five Nights at Freddy’s opens this Friday in theaters.

Poor Mike has trouble holding a job, because he has emotional and sleep-related issues. Currently, he is the sole support of his kid sister Abby, but their nasty Aunt Jane is filing motions to assume custody (presumably for the welfare support checks that would follow her). He needs a job, but unfortunately the only one his employment counselor, the very odd Steve Raglan, can hook him up with is the night watchman gig at the long-shuttered Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza family arcade. The position has high turnover, as viewers can tell from the prologue.

Rather negligently, Mike does not bother to google the property’s notorious history. It was popular in the 1980s, but a rash of child disappearances led to its closure. This information would have meant something to Mike, because he remains traumatized by the childhood kidnapping of their middle brother, Garrett, who was never recovered.

For years, Mike has revisited his abduction through directed-dreaming, hoping to finally notice a clue identifying the kidnapper. Weirdly, those dreams have become much more vivid when he sleeps in front of the monitors at Freddy Fazbear’s. There are also new children in the dream, who seem to know something. He has yet to notice the animatronic animals moving around on their own, but it is only a matter of time.

In case you were worried, the story of Five Nights is considerably different from Willy’s Wonderland. Mike’s tragic backstory and obsession with Garrett’s abductor add very different and compelling dimensions. Cawthon (who was canceled and doxxed on Twitter for having the “wrong” politics) and co-screenwriters Tammi and Seth Cuddeback marry that underlying storyline with the animatronic madness surprisingly well.

John Hutcherson carries the directed-dreaming scenes quite well. In fact, the exhausted grief and everyman decency he brings as Mike gives the film a solid anchor. However, there is no doubt the real stars are the four life-sized lethal animatronics, designed by the Henson Shop: Freddie Fazbear; Bonnie, a deranged rabbit; Chica, a frighteningly gluttonous chicken; and Foxy, an eye-patch-sporting pirate fox. They are often accompanied by Mr. Cupcake, a killer birthday-special pastry, who shares a kinship with the sentinel-orb from Phantasm.

Root Letter: Pen Pal Noir

Periodically, there are campaigns to revive the lost practice of letter writing. This film could be part of that effort—and it makes a compelling case. It also represents the road rarely taken by video game film adaptations. It is inspired by Kadokawa’s “visual novel” mystery game, but even faithful players might not realize the connection if they weren’t informed by the opening credits. Yet, Sonja O’Hara’s Root Letter deserves credit for being its own thing when it releases tomorrow in theaters and on-demand.

Carlos Alvarez is the hard-working son of an immigrant maid in Oklahoma and Sarah Blake is the frustrated daughter of an opioid-addicted single mother in Baton Rouge. They have very different tastes in music, but they find they can relate to each other when assigned to be pen pals, through their high school English classes. In fact, they keep exchanging letters, even after the project ends—and then Blake goes quiet.

Alvarez could tell something was very wrong from the last letters he received, so he drives to Baton Rouge looking for her. It will not be easy, since he does not even know what she looks like. Starting with her school contact info, Alvarez tracks down her deadbeat fair-weather oxy-addled friends. They claim to know nothing, but the way they say so holds a great deal of menace.

Root Letter is about as slow and brooding as a film can get and still be considered a thriller, but that is arguably a neat trick to pull off. O’Hara and screenwriter David Ebeltoft have a great deal of compassion and sympathy for their pen pal protagonists—and they are relatively forgiving of hardscrabble world they inhabit. Nearly every character in this film is a victim to some extent—the question is how they respond to their circumstances.

Still, it probably wouldn’t have killed O’Hara to stir the pot a tad more vigorously. However, she gets some great work from her young cast. Danny Ramirez (whom the press materials are eager to remind us played Fanboy in Top Gun: Maverick, which is definitely a seriously cool credit) brings an old school understated film noir intensity to the film as Alvarez.

Fantasia ’20: Detention

During Taiwan’s “White Terror,” the KMT ruled over a one-party authoritarian regime. Despite formerly professing an anti-communist ideology, the KMT is now well-known as the Taiwanese political party most closely-aligned with Beijing and opposed to formal independence. You would think the Taiwanese would stop voting for the KMT—and they have. Pres. Tsai Ing-wen overwhelmingly defeated KMT candidate Han Kuo-yu, who was subsequently turned out of his mayoral office in a decisive recall election. Such election results would please the students in Wei Chong-ting, if they could live to see them. Tragically, it appears most of them are trapped in purgatory, as a result of the torture they endure in John Hsu’s Detention, which screened at this year’s Fantasia International Film Festival.

The popular Mr. Chang and the very serious Miss Yin both supply books and guidance to Wei’s underground book club. Not surprisingly, a “model student” like Fang Ray-shin is not a member. Since her father is a high-ranking officer, she is about the only student who is not constantly under the microscope of Instructor Bai, the school’s military advisor. Yet, it is Chang whom Fang pines for.

Clearly, someone informed on the group, leading to disastrous consequences for them all, but Fang’s involvement is not exactly clear, even though she seems to share a similar fate as the others. She and Wei must figure it out together, when they suddenly awake in a surreal, nightmarish version of their school.

It is probably safe to say Detention is the best film based on a video game produced so far and most likely superior to any that might come in the future. Adapted from the horror adventure game of the same title, Detention is deeply steeped in Taiwanese history and also considerably informed by Buddhist teachings. Yet, the imagery is old school supernatural horror, all the way.

Fantasia ’19: Dreadout

You can think of it as the Indonesian Silent Hill. Doesn’t that inspire bushels of confidence? It is the first Indonesian video game movie-adaptation, based on a locally produced horror-survival game. Staying alive will be no easy feat, but it never is in a Mo Brothers film. This time around, Kimo Stamboel helms on his own, bringing Dreadout to bigger screens, including Concordia’s SGWU theater, where it had its North American premiere during the 2019 Fantasia International Film Festival.

This will be a case of live by the smart phone, die by the smart phone, or vice versa. To score more followers than their upstart juniors, a group of well-heeled high school seniors decide to break into an abandoned apartment building that was the scene of a notorious crime. Super idea kids. Nothing could go wrong with that plan. To enter, they need the help of Linda, a financially strapped classmate.

Of course, we can immediately tell she was the terrified little girl who witnessed the disastrous exorcism during the prologue. Soon, she also starts regaining memories of that night when the entitled Scooby-Doo gang break through the old police tape cordoning off her former apartment. It had changed since she lived there. Much to everyone’s bafflement, there is now a deep pool right in the middle of the floor. Naturally, it turns out to be a portal to a sinister nether realm that pulls Linda and Jess (the queen bee) through to the other side.

This world is populated with demonic creatures, who all want a piece of Linda. Fortunately, she discovers the flash on her phone will keep them at bay—and possibly even vanquish them. Yes, much game-play-inspired demon flashing will transpire.

As half of the Mo Brothers tandem, with Timo Tjahjanto, Stramboel has jointly directed some pretty extreme movies, like Killers, but this time he goes it alone. The results are strangely ordinary, but the atmosphere is genuinely creepy. In fact, Silent Hill comparisons are indeed apt.

The set design and art direction of Dreadout are genuinely quite striking. The film looks good and Caitlin Haldman solidly anchors the film as down-to-earth Linda. On the other hand, the rest of her classmates are just generic horror movie teens. Only Mike Lucock really stands out from the pack, to any extent, as the older, more corruptible security guard.

Dreadout moves along at a respectable clip, but it has none of the visceral intensity of a film like Killers. It is mostly just okay, which is really the film’s biggest surprise. Still, by the standards of video game movie adaptations, it ranks up there, largely from lack of competition. Recommended for game fans, Dreadout had its North American debut at this year’s Fantasia.

It Came from the Desert: B-Movie with Ants

It is a case of double retro nostalgia. At this point, the 1989 Commodore Amiga video game inspired by Them! and any number of Roger Corman sci-fi monster quickies seems like an unusual candidate for a feature adaptation, but at least it had a story. As it happens, most of the characters and plot points did not survive the property’s revival, but the ants are still in here. They will be big and mean in Marko Mäkilaakso’s It Came from the Desert (trailer here), which releases today on VOD.

Lukas Deakins has just notched another dirt bike victory, thanks in part to his brainy younger brother Brian’s legal modifications. What better way to celebrate than a sloppy kegger out in the middle of the desert? To thank his bro, he will also invite along Brian’s longtime crush, Lisa, but it will take a crisis to get him to make a move.

Fortunately, a government contractor has fused alien DNA with common ants, because obviously that is what the scientific method dictates. Of course, they are adaptive little buggers, who managed to overrun the underground facility. The smarty pants scientists thought they were being clever by genetically engineering the need for an outside catalyst for their reproduction. That would be alcohol. Well, so much for that.

ICFTD is an amiable film with two likable central characters, but it clearly assumes that plus its nostalgic premise is more than enough to carry it over the finish line. Unfortunately, it lacks the real inspiration of a film like Graham Kelly Greene’s criminally under-distributed Attack of the Bat Monsters. Instead, we are just watching the cast, with their loopy grins, gamely going through the motions.

Vanessa Grasse portrays Lisa as a relatively forceful and proactive character, even though she will eventually require some rescuing. Harry Lister Smith is unflaggingly earnest as Brian, but Alex Mills approaches accidental self-parody as the nauseatingly cocky Lukas. However, the film deserves credit for the ant effects. The CGI is light-years more convincing than anything that would have been possible in the 1950s, 1960s, or even 1980s, but there is still an eccentricity to the attacking ants that is in keeping with the campy spirit of the films that inspired it.

Frankly, it is rather surprising how straight Mäkilaakso and his cast play it, which is a point in their favor. Unfortunately, Mäkilaakso and his co-screenwriters Trent Haaga and Henry Woon, Jr. never figure out where to take it. For genre fans, the results are nostalgic, but not particularly memorable. For seriously sentimental fans of the game (clips of which appear during the closing credits), It Came from the Desert releases today (5/29) on VOD platforms, including iTunes.

Slamdance ’14: Wizard’s Way

Some legends might stand eternal, but no server last forever. When the one hosting one of the earliest surviving fantasy MMO’s is finally decommissioned, it causes great angst for two of the most dedicated players. A pair of snarky documentary filmmakers intend to capture the resulting drama, but the story evolves beyond their control in Metal Man’s Wizard’s Way (trailer here), which screened at the 2014 Slamdance Film Festival.

Although nothing could upstage Christopher Nolan receiving the inaugural Founder’s Award at this year’s Slamdance, news that Jack Black plans to develop and executive produce the American remake of Way was still pretty big stuff. He could probably star as well, in nearly any of the scruffy roles. Joe Stretch and Chris Killen (played by their namesakes) are recent film school grads, who somehow received early notice of the impending demise of Wizard’s Way.  Recognizing a good opportunity for cinematic exploitation, they seek out Julian “Windows” Andrews, a stockroom prole by day, who is the undisputed top gun amongst Wizard’s Way’s dwindling ranks.

As his schlubby roommate Barry Tubbulb explains, Windows is the only player to get married “in-game” to Elin, whom he has never met outside of Wizard’s Way. When the plug gets pulled, Windows is understandably distraught, because he has lost his “wife” along with his life’s passion. Somehow Stretch convinces the gamers to stick with their film, but he has some rather cruel manipulations scripted out for the lads. However, Andrews and Tubbulb might not be as dumb and pathetic as the would-be-documentarians think.

Frankly, Wizard is exactly what Zero Charisma should have been, but wasn’t.  There is no question in the culture war between geeks and hipsters, Metal Man, a.k.a. co-writers Socrates Adams-Florou, Chris Killen & Joe Stretch, line up solidly behind the geeks. Their sympathy for Tubbulb and Andrews is genuine and the eventual comeuppance is satisfying.

As Tubbulb, Adams-Florou lets loose with a fair amount of shtick, but Kristian Scott is surprisingly grounded (and rather reserved) as Windows.  While Killen largely avoids the spotlight (which is definitely an issue for his character), Stretch’s slow, creepy evolution into outright villain is frankly quite impressive. This is obviously a zero budget affair, but everyone in front of the camera gamely holds up their end.

You do not often see movies at festivals that tell documentary filmmakers to sod off, which is why Wizard is so refreshing.  Similar in tone to Electric Man, David Barras’s affectionate ode to comic readers, Wizard defends geek culture in general, while gently encouraging the addition of an offline component.  It all works quite well. Highly recommended for gamers and fans of eccentric British comedies, the news-making Wizard’s Way should have plenty of festival screenings in its future.

Silent Hill: Revelation—Pyramid Head Takes Another Hack

Heather Mason’s teenaged years have been difficult.  Her name is actually Sharon Da Silva, but she and her father Christopher, currently known as Harry, constantly move to new towns under assumed identities.  Supposedly, he is on the run from the law, but it is really to keep a step ahead of a bizarre death cult.  Yet, they constantly call her back to their shunned ghost town through supernatural means.  There will be a macabre homecoming in store for her in Michael J. Bassett’s Silent Hill: Revelation 3D, which opens today across the country.

Considered one of the better film adaptations of a video game, the first Silent Hill struck some chords with viewers by seriously addressing themes of faith and sacrifice.  To save her daughter, Rose Da Silva accepted banishment on the other side of Silent Hill’s dimensional portal.  Her husband has done his best to protect Sharon/Heather.  However, when Rose sends him a Candyman-style inter-dimensional warning, it may already be too late.  Sleazy gumshoe Douglas Courtland tracked down the Da Silvas before he fully appreciated the nature of his clients.  In order to save her father, Sharon/Heather resolves to give her tormentors the showdown they want.

Those who have played the survival game will know there is a complicated backstory to Silent Hill, involving Alessa, the all-powerful witch-girl, whose curse holds the cult’s powers in check.  There are also a number of monsters living in this netherworld, including fan favorite Pyramid Head.  Apparently, one of the knocks on the first film was his relative lack of screen time, so it is rather odd Revelation also uses him rather sparingly.   However, Malcolm McDowell has a long and unpleasant scene as blind bogeyman Leonard Wolf, the former cult leader committed by his own daughter.  Gee whiz, it has been quite a while since his career-defining work with Lindsay Anderson, hasn’t it?

Frankly, it is pretty easy for non-gamers to follow Revelation’s first two acts, but once Sharon/Heather arrives at Silent Hill, all bets are off.  Sure, there is a clear narrative chain of events, but the underlying logic of the how’s and why’s is rather vague.  In fact, it is rather like watching someone playing a videogame when you do not understand the rules.

Adelaide Clemens is perfectly credible horror heroine, even delivering a promo-reel worthy speech early in the film.  Of course, Sean Bean certainly knows his way around a special effects-driven production by now.  As Da Silva, he helps elevate the proceedings with his earnest everyman presence.  In contrast, McDowell and Carrie-Anne Moss do not exactly make classic villains as the Wolf family cultists.

In all honesty, Revelation still probably represents the high end of the bell curve for video game adaptations.  Good and evil have very real meaning here.  While as a gamer Bassett was reportedly already steeped in the game’s mythos, he loses control of the third act, letting the film descend into poorly lit mayhem.  There is a measure of payoff, but it comes after a head-scratching sojourn through the titular town’s sub-basements.  Only for diehards franchise fans, Silent Hill: Revelation 3D opens today (10/26) in New York at the AMC Kips Bay and Regal E-Walk, obviously scheduled with Halloween in mind.