Don Carmody, producer behind movies like The Boondock Saints, Get Carter, Silent Hill, Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, and Resident Evil: Afterlife, recently spoke to FEARnet during a set visit in Toronto about upcoming projects, including Silent Hill 2.
While discussing Afterlife and things like why they decided to go 3D this time, a question was asked as to how faithful they remain to the original video games these days, or if they just kind of make up their own stories and characters now that they’re four films into the franchise. Carmody explained that they know these movies have to appeal to faithful fans of the games and of movies in general, which is where Silent Hill 2 came up.
Carmody says:
We have always been cognizant of that — we can’t make the movies just for gamers. Of course, we always run the risk of incurring the wrath of the gamers — who are very vocal. I did Silent Hill and we are planning a Silent Hill 2 — we were getting hate mail for that one.
I think with Resident Evil, after the first installment, fans realized the story was moving forward in a cinematic way. When you play the game, you are using your imagination — you kind of sense what things will look like. The games have progressed, and are more cinematic now. In fact, the games are taking a bit from us as well. They are using our sets and characters, we are using some of their storylines… things like that. We’re probably a little closer to the game now than we were with the first film.
Jumping on the treat that was given, Carmody was then asked what he could offer about Silent Hill 2. His answer was short, but informative enough: “Just that we are hoping to start it in late spring in Toronto.”
A sequel to 2006’s Silent Hill has always been expected, but not spoken of very often. No director or cast is known at the moment; this could mean their keeping things under tight wraps, or it could mean that they just going to bring in a bunch of unknowns and get it made. It wouldn’t even shock me to see it ultimately go direct-to-DVD, but that’s just the vibe I get.
Visually, the first movie was fantastic. It was really bleak and twisted, and there were some shocking things to witness. Unfortunately, that’s where it ended: the acting — despite a solid cast — was pretty awful and no one who saw it seemed to have a clue what was going on by the time the credits rolled. A beautiful disaster, if you will.
So can a sequel improve where the first failed, or are any efforts futile?
I wouldn’t say the first one was complete disaster, or a beautiful disaster as you put it. The acting was pretty solid for what they were given, I mean, Radha Mitchell and Sean Bean are good actors. Deborah Unger is a good actress. All three did their parts well. The girl they got for Alessia was hit or miss.
From what I have seen, Silent Hill and the first Resident Evil are by far the best video-game adaptions.
Doom could have been amazing if they just stuck with the original story. It worked well for Event Horizon.
Comment by Steve _Kasan — May 10, 2010 @ 11:35 am