The Silence is one of newest Netflix original movies. It is based off of Tim Lebbon’s 2015 novel and despite the similarities, it is not a knockoff of “A Quiet Place”. The basic premise is that spelunkers exploring an unknown cave system in Pennsylvania opened a previously blocked chamber which allowed a swarm of sound sensitive monsters to escape. The film then focuses on one family’s struggle to survive the chaos. Not only do they have the avoid the monsters, but they also have to deal with a strange cult as well.
As I already mentioned the plot is similar to “ A Quiet Place”. It revolves around a family, with a deaf daughter, fleeing monsters which hunt by sound. The family is ultimately able to adapt and survive because of their deaf child. It also has similar cult elements to those in “ Bird Box”.
The film did a few things right. I really liked how the monsters looked. The Vesps were both realistic enough to be believable, and unique enough to stand out. The film’s use of sign language and whispering did an excellent job of forcing you to use your eyes instead of your ears. The pharmacy scene was fairly well done in that it evoked memories of the Raptors hunting the children in Jurassic Park. I also found the wood chipper scene to be highly amusing.
Unfortunately the film did a lot more wrong than right. The acting was incredibly flat. In one early scene a character crashes his car, flipping it multiple times, and ending up trapped in it. He was presumably in intense pain and knew he was going to die yet he remained completely calm and rational. Based on the emotion he expressed, he might as well have been reading the newspaper.
There also were several scenes which felt like their only purpose was to push the envelope.
- The Crying Baby Scene: This was completely unrelated to our cast and no one would have noticed if it was removed.
- The Dog Scene: Despite upsetting dog lovers everywhere, the cast quickly moved on from it.
- The Cell Phone Girl: While it did advance the plot, it felt like the primary purpose was to shock the audience (which it failed at).
- The Heroic Grandmother: Her actions were logical, and it could have been a good scene, except we as viewers were already told she was expendable and the family quickly moved on.
These scenes felt as if they were designed to impact the viewers rather than the cast. They could have been good if the characters actually expressed some emotion or evolved because of them, but they didn’t. They were quickly forgotten.
I also found myself questioning the science. I find it hard to believe that there would be a huge swarm of these monsters waiting to escape. This suggests that there was plenty of food for them in the caverns and no reason for them to leave their environment. From what I’ve read it sounds like the book explains this better, and it’s not that there was a huge swarm, it is that they breed rapidly. Unfortunately this was only hinted at by the movie.
The fact that they would fly around and attack during the day made no sense to me. These are creatures which evolved to live without sunlight. Based on their translucent eggs and skin they don’t have much in the way of melanin or skin pigment. After the first day in the sun they would be quite sunburnt and most animals are smart enough to avoid things which cause them pain. I can’t even imagine how the eggs would have survived in the sunlight. I could buy them being nocturnal predators, but really unless you stumbled across a nest you should have been safe at day!
It also bothered me that the family felt they could live in silence because they were used to a deaf daughter. They could live without words, yes, but that doesn’t make them stealthy. Do they know what clothes make noise when they move? Do they know how to walk to be as quiet as possible? How is the deaf daughter going to know if she accidentally made noise? And then you had the cultists. Removing your tongue may stop you from talking clearly, but you can still walk and make other sounds!
The film failed to deliver on many points. The poor acting and lack of believably made it hard to become invested in the characters. With a dime a dozen plot, you need the viewer to become invested in the characters, and that certainly didn’t happen here. It had potential, and I’m curious about the original book, but I can’t recommend the movie.
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Originally published at https://www.narrative.org on April 12, 2019.
