The Silenced

As someone who knows next to nothing about what makes a movie "good" and has no standards, I liked this movie. It certainly wasn't "horror", but it had good twists and the ending made me cry because I'm a baby who cries about everything. It was all very well acted and good enough (for me) to watch like 3 times. If you too have low movie standards, you'll probably enjoy this.

Usually the South Korean Cinema makes very great movies and quite often memorable horror movies. However, it would be impossible to keep making such movies. And "The Silenced" (aka "Gyeongseonghakyoo: Sarajin Sonyeodeul") was a deviant from the usual impressive line of horror movies to make it out of South Korea.

I hadn't heard about "The Silenced" before I stumbled upon it while browsing the horror selection on Netflix. Being a fan of the horror genre and being particular fond of Asian movies, then of course I would give "The Silenced" a go. However, it turned out to be a less than mediocre experience.

The story is about a girl who is sent to a remote boarding school where things seem quite out of place. And in order to survive, the new student must uncover the secrets stored within the walls of the school.

"The Silenced" wasn't scary at all, it was not even a thriller; it was, a best a mystery laced with supernatural elements. As such, then it was a major disappointment, because I had expected it to be more within the typical horror genre; a genre that South Korean Cinema does so well.

It should be said that the acting in the movie was quite good, and that is what kept me sticking with the movie to the very end. Even after that preposterous turn of events after the reveal of what was actually going on.

The story in "The Silenced" just wasn't particularly riveting, nor was it particularly memorable. I have seen the movie to the end, but I am sure that the movie will soon fade from memory, because it just didn't manage to find any foothold.

"The Silenced" was a disappointing movie to me, and as such I am rating it a mere 4 out of 10 stars. If you enjoy a good South Korean horror movie, then there are far better choices available.

It was perhaps a good film, but its style was a bit confusing. Individual scenes were suddenly cut off for no apparent reason, with the missing part shown much later in flash-back.

And unless you have a lot of friends or acquaintances that are oriental you might have trouble keeping track of the characters. (The old "they all look alike" cliché.)

For an OWM (old white male) like me, it especially didn't help that not only did most of the characters look very similar, they all wore identical clothing. The scenes that were fast paced didn't give me enough time to figure out who is who.

Just to make it worse, each character had two different names (their real name and their school name), and to top it off, one of the names was used for two different characters.

Being able to recognize the difference between Korean and Japanese might help too.

I suspect I'd like it better if I watched it a second time.

I didn't quite know what to expect when I watched this film. I tried to find out about it without revealing keep key plot points and had the feeling it was something along horror baseline but nothing supernatural, so I decided to give it a go. It was on Netflix but it did not advise until I looked on here that it was in Japanese with English subtitles but I'm happy to give that a go as long as the film is good. Within 5–10 minutes of the film starting, I'd forgotten I was watching it with subtitles so please don't let that rubbish you from watching this film.

The story line was good, the acting was good and it had me gripped right up until the last 20 minutes or so. At that point I realized where the story was going I was a little disappointed with the ending as I thought it was going to be something different. It felt a bit like they weren't quite sure where they were going with the story and it felt like a lot of things weren't cleared up which for me, is something I like in a film. I like a definite ending without the ambiguity that leaves you wondering what went on and leaves you scouring Google to work out what happened. So for me the ending of this film wasn't great.

That being said everything up until the last 20 minutes was really good and very captivating, I really enjoyed structure, the scenery, the setting and backdrop of the film and the skill of the actors. It's just a shame that towards the end, all of the suspense and story they had built in the film seemed to be crammed into messy, unbelievable ending that crescendoed as quickly as it started.

I would say it's worth a go but maybe go into this with an open mind about the ending because to me, it's not the sort of ending I would look for in a well structured horror film.

You can ask yourself many things with this. From morality (to mortality I guess), to group dynamics, to children with bad influences to bullying. Of course it's not that the movie points everything out, or spells everything out. Also for a movie playing mostly inside a building, this is very "far out"! There are some pretty strange things going on and by the end of it you will catch up.

Of course, the end will split a lot of people. Because while we are aware this is nothing ordinary, what we get to see is way extra ordinary. Is that something the movie can pull off? I'd say more no than yes, but it depends on the viewer. It's well done overall and it can be a pleasant watch, if you let it