This is a remake of the 2010 Spanish-language low-budget Uruguayan horror film ‘La Casa Muda’. Both the original and this remake were (allegedly) shot in one take with no actual cuts or edits with a single camera, similar to the 1948 experimental film ‘Rope’ by Alfred Hitchcock.
We begin with an overhead shot of a young woman, Sarah (Elizabeth Olsen) sitting on some rocks in a lake. As she gets off and begins to hop among the rocks back to the shore, the camera descends and begins following Sarah in real-time. She walks up to an obviously dilapidated house.
The house is three stories tall and has red-brick exteriors with all of the windows boarded up. Sarah’s father John (Adam Trese) meets her near the front steps and tells her sternly to pick up the gardening tools lying about. John then asks Sarah about her Facebook profile, and she admits that her ex-boyfriend may want to get back together with her, much to John’s disapproval.
John’s younger brother and Sarah’s Uncle Peter (Eric Sheffer Stevens) walks through the front door and greets the two of them. He says that there is a big problem in the house. They walk in, and though it is daylight outside, the house is almost pitch black as all the windows are boarded. The trio turn on their electric lanterns and follow Peter to the dining room (the source of the problem) where John hits the wall with a sledgehammer to reveal that mold has grown within the walls, and maybe throughout the entire house.
Tools and clutter are strewn everywhere. They take a picture of the mold with their polaroid camera and after her father walks out of the room Peter stares at Sarah, telling her how beautiful of a woman she has become. After they enter the living room, John and Peter then leave to go into another part of the house, and Sarah starts up the stairs when she hears a knock at the front door.
Silent House is a 2012 American independent horror film directed by Chris Kentis and Laura Lau, and starring Elizabeth Olsen. The plot focuses on a young woman who is terrorized in her family vacation home while cleaning the property with her father and uncle. The film is a remake of the 2010 Uruguayan film, La casa muda (lit. English:The Silent House), which was allegedly based on an actual incident that occurred in a village in Uruguay in the 1940s. It is notable for its use of “real time” footage and the manufactured appearance of a single continuous shot, similar to Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope (1948).
The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2011 and was subsequently purchased by Open Road Films and Universal Pictures for distribution. Silent House premiered in United States theaters on March 9, 2012. It opened at number 5 at the U.S. box office, earning $6.6 million during its opening weekend; it would go on to gross a total of $12.8 million domestically.
Silent House (2012)
Directed by: Chris Kentis, Laura Lau
Starring: Elizabeth Olsen, Adam Trese, Eric Sheffer Stevens, Julia Chan, Adam Barnett, Haley Murphy
Screenplay by: Gustavo Hernández, Laura Lau
Production Design by: Roshelle Berliner
Cinematography by: Igor Martinovic
Costume Design by: Lynn Falconer
Set Decoration by: Robert Covelman
Art Direction by: Melissa Miller Costanzo
Music by: Nathan Larson
MPAA Rating: R for disturbing violent content and terror.
Distributed by: Open Road Films
Release Date: March 9, 2012
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