It is almost exactly a year to the day that I went to see 'A Quiet Place' (2018) in the cinema. Little did I think at the time that in a year I would be watching a film which was so ridiculously similar but which was weaker in every department. This was the case, however, as I watched Netflix's new 'horror', 'The Silence' (2019). Going in to this film I wasn't expecting all that much. I really enjoyed the concept of the film and I felt that it was a concept that was capable of creating good horror moments. But there was also the big footnote of 'A Quiet Place', which had come first and had tackled the concept really, really well. So, I was not expecting 'The Silence' to live up to that quality. And you may not be surprised to hear that it is not great. It is by no means terrible, but I wouldn't say it was good either. The film opens with two cave divers tunnelling trough a prehistoric wall and unleashing an ancient, ravenous species of animal who attack anything that makes sound. These animals soon start to infest the United States, which leads the Andrews family to flee out of the city and their home in an attempt to find a more silent dwelling. Along the way they are attacked by the creatures, which have been named Vesps, and also have to face off against other people in an attempt to survive the new world they live in.
If I had to describe this film in just a phrase it would be that it is a mixed bag. Everything about it blows hot and cold. The performances, the effects, the narrative, all of these have moments of good and moments of bad, even if the bad moments do tend to outweigh the good ones. Lets take the performances for example. Stanley Tucci is an actor whose work I enjoy and he has his moments in this film, playing Hugh Andrews. He is very good in the smaller moments with him and his family members, but when it comes to the more intense moments he seems pretty checked out and doesn't feel invested. It is a similarly mixed performance from Kiernan Shipka, who plays Ally Andrews. Ally is a character who has been deaf since she was 13, and Kiernan is pretty good at portraying this. She is also good when she is interacting with the other actors and is believable in those moments, but there are times when she is communicating over face time or narrating over the film where she seems pretty stilted and is quite poor. The two most consistent performers are Miranda Otto as Kelly Andrews and Kate Trotter as her mother, Lynn. Neither are amazing but both seem emotionally invested in the story and their performances do give more weight to the narrative. The worst performance in the film goes to John Corbett as Hugh's best friend, Glenn. I don't even know how to describe this performance, it is just kind of odd. The line delivery of Corbett is really off and weirded me out every time he spoke. And, like Tucci, there are moments where he really doesn't seem that emotionally invested. No one really blew me away with their quality of acting, but Corbett was close to blowing me away with his lack of it.
The narrative is also really hit and miss. It starts out quite well, and all the moments of character building at the beginning of the film between the Andrews family is done really well. Not only did it let me know the little quirks of the characters, but also lets me know their relationships with each other and got me emotionally on board with them all. I liked the family dynamic and I felt it was done well. Well, it was done well until everything went to shit both in the actual narrative and the quality of the narrative. Once the Vesps start attacking, a lot of the charm and emotional investment that had been built up in the opening twenty minutes was lost in place of poor horror moments and boring action scenes. I think the film would have been much more suited to staying focused on the familial aspects of the narrative rather than being caught up in making an action oriented film. This becomes especially problematic towards the end of the film. Before I continue I will warn you that the next few sentences do contain spoilers so if you were planning on watching the film you should stop reading now. With twenty minutes of the film left we are introduced to a human antagonist whose whole character is 'creepy'. This makes the whole climax feel rushed and forced. It is really poor. As for the effects, these are also very mixed. The effects on the Vesps are actually pretty good and I was quite impressed with the design and how they looked. There are also some cool and gruesome practical effects that make you grimace which his exactly what they mean to do. But there is also one special effect which made me grimace when it definitely was not meant to. This was one moment in the film where a car exploded and, honestly, this explosion would not have looked out of place in a student film. It was terrible. But it was also the funniest part of the film, so it has that going for it I guess.
'The Silence' is not a good film. It is not the worst I have seen this year, but it is definitely knocking on that particular door. The performances range from good to really poor, often times from the same actor. The narrative is similarly disjointed, flip flopping from intriguing and enjoyable to cliched and dull, and the special effects follow this pattern being either very impressive or hilariously bad. It never gets to so bad it is good territory, which I actually think would have made this film a lot better, but instead it is just a very forgettable experience. The one thing it had going for it was it's concept, but even that had been done a million times better less than a year earlier. In terms of recommending this film I would have to say no, and instead recommend 'A Quiet Place' because you will get so much more enjoyment out of it.