The coaching montage is an motion film staple, one thing you noticed numerous within the Eighties. Throughout these montages, heroes could be seen pumping themselves as much as prepare for one remaining combat. They’d raise weights, they’d load up on weapons, they usually’d get good and sweaty. With “Silent Evening,” Woo appears to be making an attempt to stage an nearly feature-length coaching montage. The person we noticed operating at first of the movie is Brian, and his younger son was killed within the crossfire of a gangland shootout between these two vehicles. Through the ensuing violence, Brian was shot within the neck and misplaced his voice. This provides “Silent Evening” its hook — it is nearly completely dialogue-free. Not solely is Brian silent, however so are these round him, together with the gang members, Brian’s struggling spouse Saya (Catalina Sandino Moreno), and a detective (Scott Mescudi) trying into the case. Apart from some voices heard over radios, everybody else is (principally) speechless. When characters speak, their phrases are muffled, or drowned out, at all times indecipherable.
After the Christmas Eve homicide of his son, Brian descends into hard-drinking despair. Time passes. After which he decides to get revenge. In April, he flips his calendar to December, and on the field for DECEMBER 24 he writes in marker: “KILL THEM ALL.” Hell yeah. From right here, the movie takes on its prolonged coaching kind. In spite of everything, Brian is meant to be a traditional man, not a educated killer. He has to construct himself up to be able to get his vengeance. So he begins lifting weights, shopping for weapons, and watching YouTube movies on fight and protection. He even buys a cool automobile and soups it as much as develop into a weapon on wheels.