Review by Stephen Gaffney
Directed by: Tony Germinario
Starring: Richard Thomas, Lynn Mancinelli, Emrhys Cooper, Kristen Carey
Kira, played by Lynn Mancinelli, returns to her hometown to attend her father's funeral. The opening of the film is a dream/flashback in which it revealed she is the victim of sexual abuse. The film then unevenly tries to focus on Kira suffering with PTSD as she struggles to control her emotions being back at the family home.
There is no sugar coating this, the film is a mess. The plot involves so many characters and subplots that mean nothing or go nowhere that I found myself rewinding scenes in case I was missing out on something. I wasn't.
One recurring subplot, which could arguably be another film altogether, gave the intention that these two separate stories were going to collide. They did not, which left me scratching my head.
The seriousness of the film's subject makes this all the worse. This isn't the director/co-writer's first film, which makes it even more confusing. The best way to describe the film is a two hour soap opera. A Joey Tribbiani Days of Our Lives kind of soap opera.
The acting all around is atrocious. These people give Tommy Wiseau a run for their money. Except they are not funny, just extremely annoying.
The relationship between Kira and her mother is laughable. They hate each other scene after scene after scene after scene, then they love each other. Then they hate each other. Scene after scene.
I think the audience will get it the first time when we see Kira has her mother's number saved as "Bitch." Or when they first share screen time the dialogue is so clunky they may as well just be saying "I hate you."
Then there is the gay charcter, Kira's brother Lucas. If you want an example of a stereotypical, clichéd gay character, look no further. Again, the acting and writing here is beyond bad.
This brings me to the running time. One hour and 52 minutes. It certainly felt like it, and more. The pacing is all over the place. The previously mentioned subplots don't help at all. But even if these were cut out we would be looking at an 85 minutes of seriously bad acting.
The editing is noticeable, which is not a good thing. Director Tony Germinario makes some decisions that reminded me of being a first year college student.
One scene in particular, in which Kira revisits her childhood bedroom, has a jump cut that made me think there was a glitch in the screener. There wasn't. The director and cinematographer went out of their way to do this weird transition for reasons unknown and the end result is bad. That is just one example of the many bad decisions made on this film.
After doing some research into the film, I discovered it won a few awards. I have no idea how. This film would sit comfortably on the True Movies channel, if it were true. For those of you who aren't familiar with True Movies, it consists basically of cheap and quick films made straight for television. 10% of them being great (The Stranger Beside Me, 2003, for example ). However, The Price for Silence would easily fade into the remaining 90%.
The ending is so over the top and melodramatic it made me cringe. Literally every scene in this film has something wrong with it. There is no excuse for this low production value. Found footage films have looked better.
For a film to tackle a subject as serious as this, the filmmakers didn't put a lot of effort into it. And if they did, they should reconsider their careers and sell Avon or something because I can't see a bright future here for anyone involved.
I recommend anybody who suffers from PTSD or has suffered abuse to avoid this film, as it will just anger you. If you want a film that tackles this subject of sexual abuse I recommend you watch L.I.E, The War Zone, The Accused or Mysterious Skin. Basically anything except this film, which seems to be trying to cash in on a sensitive subject with no artistic merit.
