“Silent Night” isn’t the usual jolly Boy Meets Girl Holiday film. It’s John Woo‘s rendition of a Hollywood Action flick full of gun fights, choreographed martial arts battle scenes and car chase scenes complete with a Ford Mustang to boot. The difference is this film is sans dialogue. Interestingly, literally a silent film.
John Woo’s known for his action flicks from Hong Kong (“A Better Tomorrow“) and also in Hollywood (“Face/Off“) got my interest here as I found out in the beginning of the film that the main character Brian Godlock (Joel Kinnaman) was shot in the throat thus losing his voice. That was my clue that it might be a film without dialogue.
At first I was doubtful. I crossed my fingers that the two main lead actors would be good enough to pull this off. Thank God Joel Kinnaman (“The Killing” “The Suicide Squad“), had the bravado of an angry pissed off father but vulnerable enough as a person to show us that this film was worth watching. Brian’s son was killed because of a drive-by car chase gun wrong, Brian chased the perpetrators and victimized himself with a gunshot to his throat which almost killed him. It took him months and months to recover.
@Photo by Lionsgate – © Lionsgate
It was obvious that it would be a revenge story as we are shown a montage of the character Brian trying to train himself in self defense, car chase and operating a gun. He was going to get the help from the cops but incidentally as he visited the Police Department he was able to get clues and info who the gang members were. Thus his plan eventually was on a roll.
This is supposed to be a year hence from Christmas to the next year’s Christmas. Brian is ready to avenge his son. As a John Woo film is expected, a full 40 minutes of gun fights, knife battles, gang war, car chase scenes unfolded. I definitely enjoyed the action and the outrageous fight scenes. For me it was appropriate for the story line….needed for this film without dialogue. In spite of having Christmas as a backdrop it made us think of how cruel the underground world could be.
This Christmas Holidays, it might be a cool idea to watch an action flick, it had great acting moments from actors Joel Kinnaman and Catalina Sandino Moreno. (Hollywood should hire these two great actors for more films in the near future.) We saw the pain between the couple. You saw it in their eyes. Such subtle acting, it was just enough, it was effective. They tried to communicate but they couldn’t. It eventually made the relationship fall apart. They needed to part ways.
The films certainly had great Fight scenes and Car Chase scenes hats off to the great work of the Stunt Actors (should be nominated for all the Stunt awards this year) of Hollywood. It had that intriguing gimmick of having no dialogue – thus the title “Silent Night.” This film got my heart pumping, rooting for the protagonist and rooting for the director if he can get away with creating this silent film effectively. He took the risk. The risk I think paid off. I enjoyed the film so much not just because it was created by Famed Asian Director John Woo ( the Asian Wave is still on ! ), but because this film was well orchestrated, visually enticing and gripping up to the end. A Must See Film for the 2023 Christmas Holidays.
Grade : A-