THE BLACK SHEEP is an ongoing column featuring different takes on films that either the writer HATED, but that the majority of film fans LOVED, or that the writer LOVED, but that most others LOATH. We’re hoping this column will promote constructive and geek fueled discussion. Dig in!
Dead Silence (2007)
Directed by James Wan
“A frighteningly original film that doesn’t deserve to remain silent.”
Every so often, a horror director comes along and scares the hell out of people. It’s easy to realize after a picture or two that this dude has what it takes. Some guys establish themselves with a single film (Raimi). Some take two (Carpenter). Some take more (Craven). Today, we have very few new household horror directors, but every few years a new batch of directors pop up to stake their claim. Though unproven really, folks like Eli Roth, Alexandre Aja, and Rob Zombie have already are positioned to carry on the proverbial bloody burning torch. But one of the guys we should recognize more easily is James Wan. Dude made a hell of a splash with Saw with his writing partner Leigh Whannell, but for one reason or another he never really got his due for helping to create an empire. The posters never read James Wan’s Saw and you know what, it should. So, as we celebrate Wan’s (and Whannell’s) return to horror with Insidious, I thought it necessary to shine my black spotlight on the dismissed Dead Silence.
I know for a fact this thing bombed. It wasn’t an atom scale or anything, but it underperformed in comparison to Saw. It came and went like some many movies, but don’t sleep on this one. Dead Silence isn’t nearly as gimmicky as Saw, but it still has nearly everything quality horror needs. Creepy old lady. Check. Lots of blood and gore. Check. Hot women. Check. A great setting. Check (an abandoned theater). Homicidal dolls. Check. Dead Silence is a frighteningly original film that doesn’t deserve to remain silent. So why did it bomb? Was it the marketing? Was it the lesser Walberg factor? Are people just too frightened of creepy dolls? I’m not sure because the thing contains all necessary elements that make a horror classic. Ok, maybe not like an eternal classic that must be shown every Halloween, but something not completely forgotten in the wasteland of imdb.
Why? Well for one this movie stars a ventriloquist’s dummy named Billy. I don’t know about you but a little dummy with dead eyes in a suit is about the scariest thing ever. Yeah, Chucky is creepy because he’s for kids and all, but Billy looks evil…and Wan knows it. He enjoys lots of quiet close-ups. He enjoys the silence, the stillness of his lifeless body, which creates tension without really having to do anything. He leaves Billy dead most of the time, showing small signs of life here and there, just enough to know something is amiss. I love it when little Billy comes to life. The world around him goes into slow motion. Clocks stop ticking and sounds seem to erode just as Billy’s eyes creakily move to show the hidden life within!
Surprisingly (at least to me), I really dug the other Walhberg, Donnie. Yeah, I’ve never really taken him too seriously as an actor, but he’s the standout here as gruff cop Det. Lipton on the case of main character Jamie, who he suspects killed his wife at the beginning of the film. See, one day Jamie gets a package in the mail — Billy the doll. With his wife is dead, Jamie returns home to find out here the hell Billy came from. This is when the real plot kicks in. Like all great movies that establish lore, Dead Silence creates a layered backstory involving a small town, a lonely old Ventriloquist lady, a powerful family, a complex cover-up, and a nursery rhyme: “Beware of the stare of Mary Shaw. She had no children only dolls. If you see her in your dreams, beware you never ever scream.”
But the movie has more going for it than just that. Dead Silence falls under the serious horror category, even if it doesn’t take itself too seriously. Don’t misunderstand. The movie doesn’t have many light moments and the killer doll routine has been done enough times to become a genre all its own, yet I don’t think any of the previous entries invoked the same level of fright and the style. Even with all the dread and doom, Dead Silence manages to seem enjoyable, as if everyone involved really dug the experience. I’m sure this was a relatively cheap movie, but it looks fantastic as everything is coated with an ominous blue overtone that helps cast a dark cloud over everything. Ok, that’s damn clichéd, but so what…it’s true. The more dead the thing looks, the more entertaining it became. And that’s a hard trick to pull off.
Disagree? Buy the DVD and discover for yourself.