The Silent Hour (2024)

Director Brad Anderson's latest film is currently showing on Amazon Prime through Signature Releasing. It's the story of Frank (Joel Kinnaman from SUICIDE SQUAD and the first season of ALTERED CARBON) a Boston detective who loses his hearing. When a drug dealer is killed and the only witness is the deaf Ava (Sandra Mae Frank) the recently returned to work Frank accompanies old partner Doug (Mark Strong) to question her in the rundown apartment building where she lives.

After they leave, Frank discovers he has left his phone there and returns just in time to witness a group of dodgy policemen trying to kill Ava. He saves her, and thus begins an action-packed pursuit of the two of them through the building.

Director Brad Anderson made a big splash with SESSION 9 in 2001, following it up with the Christian Bale-starring THE MACHINIST in 2004, with his subsequent career being somewhat chequered in terms of quality. The core of THE SILENT HOUR is the chase in the building, and very good it is. However the setup is so perfunctory and clunky that the film risks losing viewers before they have a chance to get to the good stuff. Kinnaman does his best to invest Frank with a personality but our introduction to him almost feels as if it was directed by someone with little to no interest in character development and a great impatience to get to the action. It's surprising considering Anderson's involvement, but perhaps twenty years in the film business can do that to a man.

Overall, though, THE SILENT HOUR makes for action-packed low budget entertainment, the kind of B movie it was a pleasure to watch back in the days of home video, with a cast of familiar faces including Mekhi Phifer (Zack Snyder's DAWN OF THE DEAD remake, the ER TV series) and Michael Eklund (ERRORS OF THE HUMAN BODY, ANTLERS). Here's the trailer:

Brad Anderson's THE SILENT HOUR is out now from Signature Entertainment & is currently available to watch on Amazon Prime