FISHCOMBO PRODUCTIONS

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I hope to see you there.

For those who still visit, I have basically cut my gallery content by half. There are several reasons for this, but don't worry about me leaving anytime soon. I mostly canned stuff that hasn't been commented on in years, so no biggie.

I did not feel Silent Hill was a terrible movie, but I was disappointed with it. Sure, the effects were amazing. The atmosphere was fantastic. Pyramid Head looked thoroughly badass, yet his addition was purely fanservice. He serves practically no purpose in the plot other than being another demonic creature that emerges from the Otherworld of Silent Hill. Also, the movie was never genuinely scarey. Some parts were creepy, but never truly disturbing. Some scenes are nearly direct recreations of scenes from the game, and I felt that actually hurt the movie. How can you be scared if you know what's coming? They played out like cutscenes rather than parts of an actual narrative.

Speaking of story, the audience never really gets any information about the plot until the last act in a massive exposition scene told entirely in flashbacks and narration. It may work in a game, but it's bad filmmaking 101. I feel that's one of the major hurdles for video game-to-movie adaptations. Narrative devices in games work differently. Pacing is altered. Interaction adds a completely different dynamic to storytelling. When you're directing a character to walk through the darkened hallways of the elementary school in the game, it's essentially YOU navigating those hellish corridors as opposed to passively watching an actor do it. There's a disconnect that needs to be bridged for the transition to be effective. To this date, none have been completely successful.

Acting could have been better if the dialogue weren't so stupid. Cybil, while standing in a devastated building with a massive hole in the floor says, "Something bad happened here." Ya think?

The verdict: If you've played and enjoyed the games, you will probably enjoy, or at least tolerate the film. If not, you will hate this movie and want your money back.

Silent Hill was and is the only game to actually creep me out to the breaking point. Resident Evil is only scary enough to make me jump a few times until I eventually acquire a weapon that can blow anything into tiny, smokey bits. After about the first five minute of Silent Hill, I turned the system off wouldn't try it again for a few hours. That, my friends, is a disturbing game. I just saw the trailer for the movie and, by God, it looks like they got it right. I was expecting something completely off the mark, like replacing the gloomy setting and nightmarish creatures with cyborg zombies with machinegun eyes and rocket teeth, but the footage shown seems to indicate that the disturbing imagery and hellish atmosphere are intact.

I'll bet if Uwe Boll directed it, the movie would be about an actual mound of earth that stealthily devours children. The Rock would star as a grizzled marine who must travel to the center of the Earth to destroy the planet's mutated core. It would be great.

Damn, I'll bet he's reading that right now and taking notes.

It's not like they needed to change anything. It was one of those games that screamed "If I were a movie, I would not suck." Of course, compromises will need to be made for the adaptation to be successful, but, overall, I am very confident in the direction that it's proceeding. It's right up there with X3 on my "movies coming out this Spring that I am excited about" list.

I'm cleaning the gallery of art that I feel is not representative of my current abilities. If there is anything you want to save, but haven't, I strongly suggest you do so ASAP.