Film Review: Dead Silence

With director James Wan’s second feature DEAD SILENCE its good to know that he and screenwriter Leigh Whannell are not a one trick pony after the huge success they had with their first feature SAW.

The film starts off a tad predictable considering the conventions of horror films that most filmmakers believe they have to follow. Jamie Ashen (Ryan Kwanten) receives a mysterious box with a ventriloquist doll inside and while he is out getting diner for his wife and himself, the seemingly harmless dummy kills his wife. When he is accused of killing her by Det. Jim Lipton (Donnie Wahlberg) he sets upon trying to discover the origin of the dummy which leads him to his hometown and the legend of Mary Shaw (Judith Roberts) a ventriloquist who was murdered in the town after being accused of killing a child and now her spirit haunts the people and the town.

Although the film is set up in a very typical fashion it takes on the structure of the duo’s previous film SAW by delving into the mystery arena rather than having the film derive into the straight forward hack ‘n slash of most horror films. The beauty of the script is that like SAW you think you know what is going on until the grand reveal at the end that turns all your preconceived conceptions around. DEAD SILENCE actually becomes one of those rare horror films that gets better as it goes on and by the end you never feel let down or disappointed.

An independent filmmaker who writes screenplays and articles mostly in the entertainment fields.

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Film Review: Dead Silence

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