Silent House (2012)
Average Rating: 5.2/10
Reviews Counted: 124
Fresh: 51 | Rotten: 73
Silent House is more technically proficient and ambitious than most fright-fests, but it also suffers from a disappointing payoff.
Average Rating: 5.9/10
Critic Reviews: 31
Fresh: 16 | Rotten: 15
Silent House is more technically proficient and ambitious than most fright-fests, but it also suffers from a disappointing payoff.
liked it
Average Rating: 2.6/5
User Ratings: 40,262
My Rating
Movie Info
From the directors of the hit film Open Water, Silent House is a uniquely unsettling horror thriller starring Elizabeth Olsen as Sarah, a young woman who finds herself sealed inside her family's secluded lake house. With no contact to the outside world, and no way out, panic turns to terror to terror as events become increasingly ominous in and around the house. Directed by filmmaking duo Chris Kentis and Laura Lau, Silent House uses meticulous camera choreography to take the audience on a
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Cast
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Elizabeth Olsen
Sarah -
Adam Trese
John, Johnv -
Eric Sheffer Stevens
Peter -
Julia Taylor Ross
Sophia -
Adam Barnett
Stalking Man -
Haley Murphy
Little Girl
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All Critics (127) | Top Critics (31) | Fresh (52) | Rotten (74) | DVD (3)
Filmmakers Chris Kentis and Laura Lau ('Open Water') should have plugged the original's plot holes and straightened out its logic.
Top CriticThe camera's unblinking eye constantly stays with Olsen, and we feel in as much danger as she is.
It's Olsen's performance that makes Sarah's plight matter. And the actress proves that her mesmerizing turn in last fall's Martha Marcy May Marlene -- about a woman on the lam from a cult -- wasn't a fluke.
Silent House feels like a psychotic episode come to life. It's impressive and oppressive, and it very effectively gets on your nerves.
[Olsen is] terrific at showing shifts of emotion just underneath the skin of her wide, china-doll face.
Paranormal Activity has been here before, of course, but Silent House springs tangy new tricks, and Olsen is a primo scream queen.
Although it has plenty of atmosphere and tense moments, Silent House is ultimately lacking in every other department.
Moviegoers looking for a unique horror-thriller experience, who find the "real time" premise intriguing, are likely to enjoy Silent House in spite of its flaws.
Although still interesting principally as a technical exercise, this is one of those very rare cases where it's possible to recommend watching the remake first.
Elizabeth Olsen's scream-filled performance, combined with the one take filming technique and the minimal lighting make Silent House a creepy and atmospheric film, but the script only has enough material for 25 good minutes.
[Elizabeth Olsen's] impressive portrayal - and even an admittedly interesting overall conclusion - just isn't enough to rescue a film that is literally agonising to watch.
As Trish declared to Darry in Jeepers Creepers: 'You know the part in scary movies when somebody does something really stupid, and everybody hates them for it?' This is littered with those moments.
A skillful thriller with something unexpectedly insidious on its mind.
While the movie delivers fantastic atmosphere and some effective scares, there are many missed opportunities where the camera doesn't catch the moments with the most impact.
Interesting one-take cinematography and a great performance by Elizabeth Olsen are very nearly ruined by a muddled story that leaves little room for replay value.
The gap between technological fetishism and story craft now has a name: Olsen's Cleavage.
In this version transposed to the States it loses whatever claims to individuality it once had as well as wasting the talent of Elizabeth Olsen.
Elizabeth Olsen is perfectly committed to her role, yet once you get past the technical wizardry, it - like the Uruguayan original - quickly becomes tedious.
Has a powerful enough context behind it, but ... it disappoints ... Still, Olsen is a star worth following and has carved out an impressive niche in the psychological thriller genre.
Film-makers Lau and Kentis seem to lose their collective mojo 20 minutes in and we're left watching a mostly dark screen and listening to a great deal of random panting.
The problem is that the remake hasn't solved the essential defect of the first film.
It's still atmospheric enough, and like the original, has a quasi-theatrical event status. But it feels like a copy.
Olsen is, without question, one of the most intriguing, most thrilling young talents to burst onto the scene in years, and she's very very good here... so good that I wished the movie was kinder to her as a talent...
Olsen's brilliantly nervy and detailed performance deserved a flick that knew how to house it.
Ludicrous and offensive in equal measure. Avoid.
Audience Reviews for Silent House
Super Reviewer
This is just one of those films that I can't really gather my thoughts on. One one hand, I love the idea; on the other hand, the execution isn't great. Silent House has a lot of promise. Elizabeth Olsen does a good job as the girl were following around for 88 minutes. The other actors, not so much. Also, I loved the way the film was shot. We're stuck following a girl around a house that is getting weirder as we go along.
Sarah is helping her father and uncle pack up the old, family lakeside house. When her uncle leaves, only the father and daughter are left in the house. Then weird things begin happening. Sarah thinks she hears something up stairs, father goes to check it all out. Everything is fine. Father goes missing. Daughter is being chased.... Yeah, so it's not very original. I can't honestly sit here and say that this film is anything groundbreaking in the horror genre. Still there's something about it that makes me like it more than I should.
Silent House has received a ton of slack and I can understand that. The film drags and is down right boring at times. At other times, it managed to keep me in suspense when we were going down hallways and through doors. I wouldn't ever label this as a "scary" movie, but it has its moments that were suspenseful.
I won't lie, the film has its share of problems. For one it isn't atmospheric enough, and that's a vitally important element in a movie like this. Still, I really liked Elizabeth Olsen and the way the movie was shot altogether. I'm not sure whether or not I liked the movie as a whole or whether I was just able to put up with it enough. Still, I believe it's better than a lot of modern day horror films. Maybe that isn't saying a whole lot, but I still have some respect for this movie.
Super Reviewer
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- Sophia: Remember me?
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- Peter: Bite me.
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- John: Hey sweetie, I checked your Facebook page, what's his name wrote on your wall again.
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- Sophia: How long's it been since you were out here?
- Sarah: It's been a long time.
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- Sarah: You're a loser!
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- Sarah: Daddy...what did they do to you?
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Latest News on Silent House
July 24, 2012:
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March 6, 2012:
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