The Village

Title: The Village

Year: 2004

Director: M. Night Shyamalan

Summary: A group of people live in a small village completely surrounded by woods in order to escape the “wickedness” that plagues the other towns. In these woods, there are strange creatures who terrify the villagers. We are told that there is a truce between the people and the creatures. However, when skinned animals begin showing up all over the village and the creatures are seen entering from the forest, it appears that the peace is at an end. Meanwhile, a blind girl named Ivy and a boy name Lucius (Joaquin Phoenix, aka Commodus) begin to fall in love. When Lucius is injured, Ivy wishes to travel through the creatures’ territory to “the towns” in order to get medicine to help her lover.

Dave’s Rant: M. Night Shyamalan. What are we going to do with you? At times you are brilliant. Other times you are puzzling. And yet other times you are downright awful. He was at his best 14 years ago with the extremely successful The Sixth Sense; it has been all downhill since. Shyamalan tries too hard at this point: his stories get bigger and bigger plot holes and his twists become more predictable. But enough about him. The Village does ask some interesting philosophical questions relating to violence in society and using fear to control a population. It makes you think about the true nature of human beings and the violence in our world. Joaquin Phoenix does provide some quality acting even though you have to turn up your TV every time he speaks because he likes to whisper. There are some beautifully scripted scenes that you long for throughout the movie. In addition, this would be a pretty badass Halloween costume:

 

That’s basically it though. The rest deals with Shyamalan’s obsession with the color red (which ends up having zero impact on the film), a blind girl who manages to find her way through an entire forest even after being attacked by a creature, and shots of chairs standing alone. This is the End was a scarier movie than The Village. It’s dry and uneventful and the signature Shyamalan twist was less than stellar. We can only hope that Shyamalan learned his lesson from this (oh wait he made half a dozen movies after this).

Memorable Quote: “Do your very best not to scream.”

Rating: 3/10