Rating: PG-13
Director: John R. Leonetti
When a couple of idiots, in the name of research, accidentally open up an underground cave filled with ancient, blind winged creatures who hunt by sound, the earth is soon decimated and doomed to silence in this Netflix-produced thriller starring current hot-property Kiernan Shipka ("Chilling Adventures of Sabrina"). Here she plays Ally, a 16-year-old who lost her hearing in a car accident at age 13 and now travels the desolate landscape of what used to be the east coast USA with her family in search of help or a safe place to live. A little too uncomfortably similar to John Krasinski's A Quiet Place, The Silence hauls out every end-of-world trope in its execution, oddly enough not even utilizing Ally's deafness as any real aid in helping to defeat the creatures who hunt by sound; indeed, the device of her hearing loss seems added to provide a reason for why the family can all speak in ASL (American Sign Language). Stanley Tucci is good as Ally's father, but even he seems nearly as bored as Shipka does here, the filmmakers putting their actors through the usual end-of-world movie paces (having to locate medicine for a sick/hurt family member, running across a band of hicks who may be even more dangerous than the creatures themselves, Ally sleeping all alone and defenseless in an upstairs bedroom while the family huddles downstairs to sleep for protection, even though there is strength and numbers and as a group they were all recently attacked), but it's all wooden as the performances themselves. Nothing new or original, and even a so-so fan of A Quiet Place like me would recommend that as the superior film to watch over this retread of stuff we've seen before. 5/10 stars
No comments:
Post a Comment