Le Village

In recent years, M Night Shyamalan's reputation has taken a serious beating, having directed universally panned Razzy films (such as The Last Airbender and The Happening), and even some recent successes (Split, Glass) haven't been enough to salvage his career. However, slightly earlier in his directorial filmography sits this genuine horror-mystery masterpiece, criminally underrated and judged undeservedly.

The Village is a different take on a horror trope, detailing an isolated community's resolve against a hidden threat in the surrounding forest. As this genre goes, the cast does not get any better: Sigourney Weaver, Joaquin Phoenix, Adrien Brody and Brendan Gleeson all feature prominently, as well as relative unknowns Jesse Eisenberg and Dallas Bryce Howard in some of their earlier roles. All are individually excellent and well-cast, perfectly depicting the repressed fear of a society without outside influences.

The plot of is consistent and of genuine quality, which doesn't often translate in the horror genre; however, do not be dissuaded by the premise of horror - The Village plays more off the resulting drama than cheap jump scares, and slow burns until the revelations in the second half blow the script open. The forest village is the ideal setting for this hidden evil, sparsely populated and somewhat bleak - the integral use of red and yellow elevate the cinematography further, making the environment more distressing.

The Village should be a must-watch purely on the merit of the plot: some may not connect with the subtleties of the script and the nuances of the story, but those who take the time to invest will be thoroughly rewarded with a quality film.

As with M.Night's other movies, I enjoyed this latest outing, especially the performances of the leads. I think the movie suffered in overall response due to a poorly conceived marketing plan.

The movie was sold as a horror film and fans of that genre went into this with that mindset in place. When the film actually turned out to be a look at how we try and protect those we love from the horrors of the "real world", fans were upset and rightly so. As anyone that has enjoyed M.Night's movies, all is not what it would seem. I think the marketing pushed too hard the horror aspect which created an expectation that was not going to be met.

I think if you go into this movie expecting another commentary on spiritual and moral themes, you are going to like this. If you are going into this for the scare factor, you are going to be left empty.

I read somewhere that The Village was M. Night Shyamalan's best and most underrated movie. I wouldn't agree with that as The Sixth Sense was his best to me. But that's my opinion. The Village is entertaining though, like most of his movies, with the right amount of suspense. The cast is great as well, all top class actors and actresses so bad acting isn't present in this movie. To be honest this is my second viewing of this movie, and I liked it more the first time but that's just because of the element of surprise that plays a big role in his movies. It's a good movie for a first time viewing.

I don't think I've ever been more shocked by how much I liked a film. I had very low expectations when I decided to watch "The Village," because I knew how much critics had panned it. I'm not saying that I regard the consensus of the critics as sacrosanct. But the movies I love are rarely ones that have earned critical scorn, so by the law of probability I doubted that this one would be any good. Besides, I had noticed a steadily downward slope in the quality of M. Night Shyamalan's films since "The Sixth Sense." When "The Village" was released and subsequently panned, it seemed to fit the pattern that I myself had noticed. So I didn't go and see the film. Only recently did I take a look at it on cable, more out of curiosity than anything else.

And alas, I found the first fifteen minutes rather slow. The movie has a lot of characters, and it doesn't quickly establish which ones are the most important. All we see is this primitive nineteenth-century village in the midst of woods that the villagers believe to be haunted by ominous, sentient creatures who will not harm the people as long as they don't set foot in the woods. The villagers have all sorts of rituals to protect themselves from attack, such as avoiding the color red (what is it with Shyamalan and red?) and wearing yellow hoods. But rules are meant to be broken, and a quiet, mysterious young man played by Joaquin Phoenix wants to journey into the woods so that he can visit "the towns" on the other side, which boast superior medicine. Among other things, he wonders if he'll find a cure for his mentally handicapped friend (Adrien Brody). In the meantime, he's falling in love with the blind girl (Bryce Dallas Howard) whose role in the plot will expand as the movie progresses.

The love story between Phoenix and Howard is well-handled and believable, transcending the romantic clichés. The two characters seem to possess a common understanding and don't have to talk much in order for us to feel the developing bond between them. But what they do say to each other is intriguing. My favorite line is "Sometimes we don't do things we want to do so that others won't know we want to do them." Their personalities also transcend stereotype, particularly with Phoenix: while stoic and courageous, he's also shy and withdrawn, as revealed in scenes where he passes letters to the public council instead of speaking in front of them. His ultimate significance to the story turns the heroic convention on its head.

Everyone in the village speaks in an oddly formal manner, using big words and avoiding contractions. The accents are American, but the diction is like that of a nineteenth-century English novel. Amazingly, the actors make this language sound natural as it rolls off their tongues. The cast includes several familiar faces: William Hurt, Sigourney Weaver, Brendan Gleeson, and the aforementioned Phoenix and Brody. But the star of the film is the as-yet unknown Howard, who delivers a performance so compelling that it's a shame the film was trashed by critics.

Much of the film concerns the relationships of the characters in the village, but the mystery of the creatures also dominates the plot. This is more of a quietly creepy "Twilight Zone"-style tale than outright horror. Like Shyamalan's other films, it ultimately carries a message of hope and optimism. But Shyamalan does not forget his horror roots. No other Hollywood filmmaker today is better at crafting scenes where a character is being haunted by an evil presence. These scenes work because of Shyamalan's acute sense of how nightmares feel. Like all skilled horror directors, he knows not to focus on the monster itself but on the panicked reaction of the character being stalked.

While the use of a blind character is hardly a new device, Shyamalan handles the scenes with Howard in an interesting way. Instead of the usual approach of teasing the audience by showing exactly what the blind character doesn't see, he practically makes us blind along with her. He has the camera follow her as she walks, so that we don't see what's in front of her. We soon realize that we are seeing little more than what she is able to discern about her surroundings. In crucial scenes, we are effectively almost as much in the dark as she is.

I cannot say much more about the plot without ruining the movie's surprises, which are abundant. Critics dismissed "The Village" as a crude exercise in plot manipulation. I couldn't disagree more. While I'm not certain that the logistics of the plot work in every detail, most of the criticisms I have heard reflect a superficial reading of the story.

The film has the same basic structure that Shyamalan always uses, where we are swept up in the events and only at the end do we find out what the movie was truly about. From there, we have to think backwards to understand the ultimate meaning of the story. I have seen the movie three times now, noticing new things each time. The social themes make me think that Shyamalan is familiar with Joseph Campbell's works on primitive societies and the origin of drama. The back story is very well thought out compared to that of the average thriller, and I feel some disappointment that more people aren't able to appreciate it. The beauty and genius of this film is a well-kept secret.

I will not go into details about the plot of the movie, or how good or bad the movie was. What i would like to tell is how good i felt that evening as i went to bed. As I was resting my head on my pillow, i felt extremely good about humanity. My heart and mind were filled with hope about the future. That is what the movie did to me. In am writing this 10 years after seeing the movie, and i can still recall with clarity how i felt that evening in bed. Hence, the movie gets a 10 from this reviewer.