James... James... Silent Hill 2 (2001)
I've jumped, I've cringed, I've studied the tired glow of exit signs instead of the action on the screen. But I've never been scared.
It is almost insulting to anyone reading this to point out that film is voyeurism. We are passive observers to someone else's story. We sit helplessly as characters we know only what we are presented with are tugged along some set track, witnessing their fate irrelevant of our "presence."
There is an intense element of separation when dealing with the medium of film. Movies that attempt to "break the fourth wall" seldom work, particularly in the genre of horror (The Devil's Chair 2006) This consequence of separation due to observing as opposed to
participating is particularly detrimental to horror films. Whatever's fucking with the hapless victims is a threat to them-- not to you. Even films that are based upon timeless folk stories and urban legends loose their basal effect by enacting someone else's story, someone else's consequences, someone else's fate. This is the limitation of film.
When I say that I've never been frightened by a film, I don't mean to sound like habituated snob unsusceptible to fear in media. In fact, that's far, far from the truth. The first and foremost thing to scare me-- and I mean deeply terrify me-- has been a book, which I will address the subject of in a post of it's own. The second, which is the subject of this entry, comes from a perhaps unexpected source.
Video games.
With the advance of technology and the introduction of "next-gen" systems constantly making "impossible" look obsolete-- there is still a stigma attached to this medium. I strangely spend a lot of time defending video games as a serious legitimate form of art and story telling but even I have a difficult time not conjuring the Legend of Zelda chiptune theme and imagery of obese plumbers having suspicious relationships with mushrooms when hearing "video game."
This is truly unfortunate. Thought of a mindless entertainment, kid-stuff. Video games have and continue to be an extremely powerful vehicle for story telling, especially held against film. Video games defy the time and space limitations of film. A story that unfolds over the course of thirty plus hours can be exceptionally more complex than a two hour slot that must hold a cohesive beginning, middle and end.
Obvious benefits aside, the most powerful is the inherent necessity of the complete absence of the fourth wall. A character will move along a set path as in film-- but only does so because you, the player, allow it to be. A symbiotic relationship evolves. The player needs the character to experience the story and the character needs the player to be allowed to do so. This "partnership" results in not only an emotional investment that is fundamentally more personal than in film but inflicts the events of the story onto the players themselves. When a player's avatar is attacked, so is the player and so on. The advancement of video games has brought decision making heavy handily into play-- no longer just a guide, the player is actually responsible for and writing the fate of their avatar from their own choices.
There are several quality horror games. The Fatal Frame series (Namco, 2001 - 2008) stands out particularly. Eternal Darkness (Silicon Knights, 2002) Kuon (Agetec, 2004) and The 7th Guest (Trilobyte 1993) are a few others worth noting. For the sake of my darling husband, I'll begrudgingly give credit where credit is due and obligatorily list Resident Evil (Capcom, 1996 - 2009.) The best of the best, however, great big draggy knives down-- is the Silent Hill series (Konami, 1999 - 2009.)
Silent Hill, as a whole series, is beautiful, haunting and impossibly fucked up. There is one however, that undeniably stands out. Released in 2001, the second installment shattered the concept of video game story telling. If you are reading this, there is a large chance that you've encountered this game of your own accord. I don't want to re-hash the story or give a personal review Silent Hill 2, I want to talk about what makes it stand out as superlative horror.
Spoiler warning.
Silent Hill 2 follows the desperately morose James Sunderland
on an insane search for his dead wife. The game begins with James studying the hollows of his face in vandalized bathroom. "I got a letter. The name on the envelope said "Mary". My wife's name... It's ridiculous, couldn't possibly be true... That's what I keep telling myself... A dead person can't write a letter." Here, in the first few seconds of the game, before the player has even taken control, Konami succeeded in a hugely subtle way. Logic begs, who in the hell would drive to a resort town in search for their deceased wife upon receipt of a letter? Yet, the way James is introduced, regardless of the absence of history, a vague explanation and a logic defying quest-- we trust him.
It is the responsibility of the creator of fiction to convince the audience that the universe in which their story transpires is valid and accepted. Konami seamlessly succeeds at making the player believe and accept. James is a mess. He has become literately lost without his wife and in his increasing loneliness decided to do something impossibly delusional. We accept that James is a sick, desperate and broken man and still, we trust him. We want to help him and we believe in him. As a player, we become him.
James is also, for lack of a better term, pretty lame. Silent Hill excels at producing protagonists that in of themselves contribute to the anxiety of the experience. James isn't an ex-marine or a cop-- in fact, it's assumed that he's never fired a gun. When he runs for extended periods of time, he stops to catch his breath. He swings a bit of wood debris haphazardly to defend himself. This is a stark contrast to the style of Resident Evil where everyone is equipped and trained to wield machine guns and grenades. The enforced helplessness and vulnerability transcends into the player-- James weakness becomes their own fragility.
Silent Hill 2 also boldly twists the concept of "monster." What is a monster? A creature? Or can a monster be a concept? Or how about, even a person? Is a monster, by default, an antagonist? Or can it be a narrator? A relevant, overlooked piece of information? Something familiar? Maybe even yourself? Konami abandons the tired and true things that go bump in the night in favor of something impossibly more sinister. Every monster that appears in the game is a manifestation of James' subconscious. While this is not apparent until significantly later in the game it is impressively effective from the start. There is an omnipresent recognition of an unnamable significance to these creatures-- and when that significance is subtly revealed the ramifications are immensely disturbing. Like a name caught against the back of your teeth, like a buried and forgotten memory.
Just that, is in the end, the heart of the story. When after hours, days, weeks of guiding the bereaved James through literal hell for the madman hope of finding his dead wife results in an unexpected revelation, the scary gets a lot scarier. Gradually the featureless pairs of writhing female legs fused at the waist make sense in way that they shouldn't. James' drive isn't born from heartsick hopelessness, it's from desperate, fucked up delusion. Worst of all, James lied to you. You endured with him, sympathized with him. You hoped and mourned with him. You rallied for him. Everything that he did, said-- you believed in. You connected with him, merged with him. So in the end, what does that make you?
Aside from the beautiful, terrifying creature design, the complex and standard-shattering story, Akira Yamaoka's sound design is completely stand alone. Yamaoka has provided the score for every Silent Hill, including the shitty film adaption (2006.) The sound effects become as relevant and powerful of a character as James himself. Silent Hill 2 utilizes sound to tell pivotal fragments of the story. Whispers, breaking glass. It's not just atmospheric, it's critical. Such focus and use of detail mandates a near paranoid attention.
The most consequential aspect to Silent Hill, as applies not only to Silent Hill 2 but to the series as a whole is unquestionably the atmosphere. Team Silent, above all others, has got this down to absolute flawlessness. A basic formula is utilized. Darkness. Limited vision. Claustrophobia. None of that is new or even particularly interesting. What is, however, is more of a consequence of the game's origin as opposed to something intentional.
The inception of Silent Hill has been attributed, in large, to American horror. The film Jacob's Ladder (1990) has been cited as a major source of inspiration by Team Silent. In the original Silent Hill, several of the street names are titled after horror authors, the "easter-eggs" and tributes are seemingly endless (even the trip-hop band Portishead makes an appearance.) The series itself takes place in the American midwest, was inspired by American horror following American protagonists-- developed by a Japanese team. What makes Silent Hill's atmosphere so defilingly frightening on a fundamental level is that it's foreign idea and presentation of native culture. Everything is familiar, recognizable-- but there is something off. Not enough to even be noticeable on a practical level though enough to be subduedly, yet undeniably unsettling.
