In the vein of A Quiet Place and Bird Box, Netflix’s John R. Leonetti-directed The Silence tells the story of a family attempting to survive a world terrorized by a deadly, primeval species who hunt only with their acute hearing. While I’ve never read Tim Lebbon‘s novel, Carey and Shane Van Dyke‘s adaptation is a mess of ideas clumped into a joyless and forgettable hour and a half.
Starring “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina’s” Kiernan Shipka and the always great Stanley Tucci, neither have enough star power to save this taxing killer bat movie that forgets to be fun. It’s just way too serious and never offers the audience any release. For example, there’s a back-to-back sequence that should have been a crowd pleaser, only to fall extraordinarily flat on its face. There’s an issue with film’s tone, the way it was shot, and also how it was all edited together. Fair or not, I put the blame on Leonetti’s shoulders.
It’s a bummer because the bats are kinda cool, and we’re sold on the idea that they’re millions of years old. They’re basically “dino” bats and are vicious. Leonetti leans into the horror, but a lot of that is lost on the decision to shoot during the day. This is problematic because of the heavy use of CGI and how badly it can look in daylight. Instead of being a scary bat movie, The Silence plays more like a Syfy Original, only without the humor.
The Silence is more about the family than the bats, an inherent problem of films that have no clear antagonist. In fact, the film almost completely abandons the bats and shoehorns a cult into the final 20 minutes. The conflict between the preacher and the family feels forced, especially since there’s no foreshadowing of their existence. Outside of a brief meeting late in the film, the cult quite literally come out of nowhere.
What’s even worse is that the film doesn’t have anything to say, or at least it was lost on this writer. The screenplay is just bad. There’s too much exposition about the bats, so much so that the characters literally relearn everything they’ve already been told on the television during the opening scenes. The characters are constantly talking (when it’s established that they all know sign language) and making noise, and the rules installed earlier in the film are abandoned and used as devices later on (i.e. the use of fire).
It’s frustrating having to put The Silence up against A Quiet Place, but the former does a lot of the same things only worse. When you have an example of superb filmmaking to learn from, how is it possible to strike out so badly? The Silence isn’t just bad, it’s boring, which is a film’s ultimate sin.
