My idea for this post came from an image I saw on Pinterest. I do think the image was technically a joke I didn't understand, but it gave me this idea.
I recently watched Sightless, which is about a woman who goes blind. In hindsight, that would have been a perfect fit for this post, but I have already reviewed that on my blog, and I don't want to include it again. (You can read my review of it here, though.) That, combined with the Pinterest image, created this idea in my mind. Taking a look at how movies deal with different things that are seen as necessary for a film – such as sight and sound.
And so, we begin with sound.
A deaf and mute writer who retreated into the woods to live a solitary life must fight for her life in silence when a masked killer appears at her window.
A quick aside. I watched it the for the first time a few years ago, with a friend who loathes horror films. I watch them with barely any reaction, but she was terrified the entire time, and was gripping my arm incredibly tightly. I had to give her a pillow to hold onto instead, because I was starting to lose circulation to my fingers.
My Review!
Deafness has isolated Maddie. She moved from the city, to live in a secluded cabin to focus on her writing. She can video chat with her friends, and she has made friends with her neighbours, but she is still alone. When she finds herself being stalked in her own home by a man outside, who seems intent on killing her, she must do whatever she can to survive, even though she has the disadvantage – he has weapons he knows how to use, whereas she cannot hear him, scream, or call for help.
Maddie is smart, but there is only so much she can do. She is in the middle of nowhere, with no way to get help, or to get away herself. The best she can do is to lock her doors and try and hide away from the windows, but it wouldn’t be difficult for the man to simply break a window and climb in. It turns into a game of cat and mouse, him circling as she tries to find different ways to do what she needs to in order to survive.
With Maddie being unable to hear, there are scenes where you see things happening behind her, things that she has no idea about, because she cannot hear the tapping on the window, the footsteps. You almost beg her to turn around and notice, but there is nothing you can do but sit and watch. The horror aspects of this film are on the side of keeping up the tension, although there are some rather gruesome injuries including broken fingers at very unnatural angles. Just to warn you.
We now move onto sight...
Most people dismissed the reports on the news. But they became too frequent; they became too real. And soon it was happening to people we knew.
Then the Internet died. The televisions and radios went silent. The phones stopped ringing
And we couldn’t look outside anymore.
A quick aside (before watching the film). The same friend who I watched Hush with watched this movie one night. Once again, she hates scary films, but I wasn't with her to watch it. So I woke up to hundreds of messages from her, conveying her terror as she watched this film. I think she had been messaging me the entire time she watched it to try to not be so scared.
Extra side note. While watching this, I wasn't too sure if I had it right, and this had been the movie my friend had watched, because I didn't think it was all that scary. But, I started to remember some of the messages she sent, and I'm certain now this is what she watched. There was a lot of focus on the names of the children, if I remember rightly.
My Review!
Malorie was having enough trouble coming to terms with her pregnancy, and the fact that she would have a child to look after soon. The end of the world arrived at just the right moment to take her mind off it. People around her start going crazy, losing their minds and killing themselves. Malorie finds herself inside a house full of strangers, simply trying to survive.
Navigating the world when you can’t open your eyes or you will die seems to be a very difficult thing, not that the things the characters do are entirely simple. Closing the curtains and making sure the outside stays outside keeps them safe, but when food starts to run out, a trip down the road in a car with sensors, letting you know which side is too close to something, is a necessary risk. No one can trust anyone – as the song of the siren was murderous to sailors, the monsters will cause you to hear those you do trust, trying to convince you it's safe to remove your blindfold and have a little look – it's also rather like Medusa, now that I think of it.
Alongside this, there is a timeline several years on, where Malorie has two young children with her, and is trying to journey along a river blind. The urge to simply rip your blindfold off and reorientate yourself seems almost impossible to resist. The entire film itself moved a little slowly, it seemed to drag on a bit. I wish that there had been more of a tension built by showing the viewer what the characters were unable to see, like in Hush, where the viewer is begging Maddie to turn around. Instead, we are as blind as the characters, and, not being in the situation, it's a lot less tense and dramatic. I remember this film being very popular a while ago, and, unfortunately, I don't think it lives up to the hype.
It is still an excellent addition to this post, though – this film is completely about seeing no evil, and to stay blindfolded to survive.
And to end, we are back with sound, except this time, instead of being unable to hear, you can't make any noise...
A quick aside. I was adamant this was the movie I wanted to watch for this post, but I couldn't find it anywhere to watch for free. I debated for a while, about whether I should try and find a similar film, but quickly decided against it and bought A Quiet Place I and II. I now own both on DVD (yes, I still use DVD. And love them.)
My Review!
The world has been taken over by creatures, who hunt by sound. Even stepping on the wrong spot on the floor and making the floorboards squeak is enough to bring them running for their next meal. Evelyn and Lee know just how dangerous the creatures are, and will do anything to keep their children safe.
Trying to stay silent in a world surrounded in sound is almost impossible, especially considering Evelyn is nearing her due date to give birth. In a world of sound, though, being deaf does not give Evelyn and Lee’s daughter an advantage. She can’t hear the creatures coming, and although Lee is constantly trying to fix her hearing aids, they never seem to work.
This film uses sound wonderfully. There is very little spoken dialogue, most of the dialogue is shown through sign language. The lack of normal sound, like chatter, or even the clink of cups, makes any sound so much more dramatic. You can feel what the characters feel. Silence, and then shock at a small clatter, because it is so different, and dangerous. I found myself feeling like I could make no noise either, and watched the entire film in complete silence. I even realised I was putting my cup of tea down really gently, so it didn’t make any noise. The sound design in this film is amazing, and (since I didn’t really know what this movie was about until I watched it) completely unexpected. Even now, ten minutes after I finished watching it, I am slightly apprehensive of the noise of my keyboard as I type this. This film has plenty of tension, and it definitely immerses the viewer.
I have absolutely no regrets over purchasing this film on DVD, because after watching it, I know I’m going to be watching it again and again.
And done!
I feel like most of my posts are very straight forward, being a review of a book, a movie, or a short story of some kind. This time, though, I am really rather proud of this post. I actually planned the whole thing out, and spent three consecutive evenings writing it (there were three films. What, did you think I was going to watch them all in one go?!)
Anyway, that's all for now...
Bye!
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