A Real Life Silent Hill?

Posted by: Jerrica

In 1962, a small mining town in the coal country region of Pennsylvania was smoked out from beneath the earth and abandoned by all but a handful of residents left living in the hazard zone once known as the Borough of Centralia. A smoldering mist rises from spots all over the condemned ghost town. Now, 40 years after some burning trash in a mine lit an exposed coal vein and ignited an abundant supply of underground fuel, the fire continues to burn with approximately a century's worth of coal to feed it and ensure the little town remains deserted. To this day, the borough is shrouded in rising plumes of white fog, and roads to it are blocked or forsaken.

Does that sound like the setting of a good horror flick? Roger Avary thinks so. You may recognize his name from such screenwriting credits as "The Rules of Attraction" and "Killing Zoe", and Centralia was his real life inspiration when writing the script for "Silent Hill." The movie is based on the horror video game franchise that competes with "Resident Evil" for dominance in its genre. With "Resident Evil" two movies ahead of the game, "Silent Hill" makes its theatrical debut on April 21st. With Avary's muse in the form of a town that has spent 40 years and 40 million dollars battling ruin, obscurity, and visibility conditions that echo the eerie atmosphere of the game, the movie has a good chance of capturing the mood and instilling fear in its audience, and possibly causing a run on flashlights.

The real Silent Hill has its own unusual story. Between 1981 and 1984, the population took a nosedive from 1,000 to just 11 people after the government evacuated practically everyone in the area to nearby towns with the exception of a few citizens who still call Centralia their home. These last souls left on the dying land, including Centralia's mayor, choose to stay despite sinkholes (the one that made the nation take notice in 1981 was 4 feet wide and 150 feet deep) and an estimated 350 acres affected (expected to spread to about 3,700 acres over the course of the 100 years of life left to the fire). What keeps anyone anchored in a remote ghost town in the rolling hills of Pennsylvania with flames eating the ground out from under their feet? As per this quote on UGO.com, Mayor Lamar Mervine has a simple answer; "I like it here."

While Centralia sounds like a winning candidate for "Weird U.S.," the parallels between the film version and the real life town probably end where "Silent Hill" brings on the supernatural horror, giving an already unsettling tale a creepy edge. After all, to a creative mind like Avary's, it seems like the things that go bump in the night would like it there too. When "Silent Hill" hits theaters, there will most likely be comparisons made and attention drawn to Centralia and its novelty as a basis for the next big horror game-to-movie fright fest. You can download some video for the real life Silent Hill right here