Summary
Making the audience ponder just what they would do in this situation, Silencio will leave you questioning your choice for days.
From director Lorena Villarreal (Las Iloronas) comes Silencio, a mystery thriller that will keep you pondering the questions for days. Starring John Noble (TV’s Fringe), Rupert Graves (V for Vendetta) and Melina Matthews (Mama). In short, we follow Ana (Matthews) who must uncover the secrets of her grandfather James’s (Noble) mysterious stone found in the Zone of Silence to rescue her son.
The story reveals the big mystery about the stone early on. We know that it can change the recent past, which James does on the discovery when he gets to save Ana from a fate which would still take her whole family. This does fall into the storytelling question of “what would you do, if you could save a loved one and see someone else taken?” The Box offered a similar question in the past and it is one that will give the audience a quandary they would struggle to answer themselves, going back and forth about their decision.
The film doesn’t hold back with twists along the way which will leave you shocked when they happen and is great to see in any film. With this positive, there must be a negative which could turn an audience away: Silencio does bounce between English and Spanish way too often, which can turn the casual viewer off; the film should have stuck to either of the languages for the whole film.
The film uses the mystery of the Zone of Silence, which is known as the Bermuda Triangle of Mexico, and there are stories of unexplained events in this location which starts with a missile crashing there. It feels like we should have given more focus to this location because its mystery felt like it was going to be a major factor in the opening credits.
When we start looking at the performances we get to see John Noble, who was the star of TV’s Fringe, and his performance in this film makes it feel like he has just stepped right back into those shoes as the scientist figure that keeps his words calm and to the point in each of his scenes. However, he also balances the version of his character that has been struggling to keep his mind together. Rupert Graves as Peter is the former student of James, which has become his own iconic figure in the science world, studying the Zone of Silence. He does give us a good performance even with another actor, Nic Jackman, playing a younger version of him. The true star of the film must be Melina Matthews because she carries the emotional factors in the film, with her character still feeling the effects of being the lone survivor of the early accident, dealing with her grandfather whose mind is gone, raising a child alone while being a doctor helping the people in need.
Overall Silencio is a mystery thriller that will keep you guessing before asking you the question; the question that will remain with you long after watching the film, and now we wait in anticipation to see what Lorena Villarreal will give us next.
