The Village
25 August 2004, the wee hours
I enjoyed The Village. Shayamalan is very much a modern day Hitchcock. The scenes where he wanted to thrill the audience worked well, judging by the gasps and screams that would echo through the theatre—and by the feeling of Shima crushing my hand. The movie is about a village in a valley surrounded by a forest inhabited by monsters. The monsters for some reason are breaking their truce with the village and attacking. I thought the acting was top notch. I was especially impressed with the heroine, Bryce Dallas Howard. The Village is some ways similar in style to Shayamalan’s previous efforts, especially Signs. I was glad to see Shayamalan move away from his usual pivotal scene that reveals the big twist in the movie. His previous three films all have a scene, usually done with flashbacks, that reveal the extra layer to the film we didn’t see till the end. Shalyman’s managed to make a film similar in style to his old work, but at the same time managed to get away from something that I think would quickly wind up being cliche. I recommend you check the film out, though be warned I think this is a film you will either love or hate.
I watched The Village this afternoon at the Rainbow Cinema at Fairview mall. For those of you not from Toronto, Fairview mall used to have a pretty nice cinema compared to those that existed when I was grade school. By the end of high school all those new super cinemas basically made it look pretty lame. Recently, the cinema got turned in to a Rainbow Cinema, which is apparently some chain that offers up cheap movies. If you are in Toronto, don’t watch movies at Fairview. Children will be in the cinema, and they will not shut up. Trust me on that.
I’m sorry I crushed your hand! Some how I thought that would be better than being the only one screaming in a theatre filled with little children. I’ll know better next time! :)
I give it a 5 YAY rating. I would explain why, but I think I would reveal too much of the plot.
by sh!ma on August 25 2004, 1:40 am #
Personally, I thought it was his weakest to date. I did not enjoy it other than the efforts the costuming department put into making the monsters.
Ram, you should work on some spoiler code so people can talk about stuff like this. White on white text would do it.
by Dave on August 25 2004, 1:46 am #
I think it’s one of his better films to date. I’ll have to figure out how to make a spoiler tag of some sort. I think your white on white text idea is good. I’ll experiment with something. This is a film I would like to discuss.
by ramanan on August 25 2004, 1:58 am #
Has any other director in recent memory affected moviegoers with such diverse feelings? No… can’t think of any. Truly Hitchcockian.
Well its releasing Sep 3 in the land of Oz. Can’t wait.
by Sunny on August 25 2004, 2:46 am #
I thought the guy that narrated was pretty good, like the voice
by simon on August 25 2004, 12:05 pm #
“Has any other director in recent memory affected moviegoers with such diverse feelings? No… can’t think of any. ”
– How ‘bout Kubrick? You either love or hate his movies, but usually everyone has an opinion.
by serena on August 27 2004, 1:19 am #
This will prolly sound absolutely ridiculous but I haven’t seen any other movie by Kubrick other than “Eyes Wide Shut” which (prolly given that I was 13 or 14) didn’t make any sense. It was down-right bizarre.
But I have seen AI and loved it. I read somewhere that it was one of Kubrick’s pet-projects which before his death was handed to Spielberg. Some critics panned the movie (well he was working on Minority Report at the same time) but Spielberg maintained that it was true to Kubrick’s vision. So we only have his words to go on.
Well back to Shyamalan. I am noticing a trend with his movies (especially the last two) that either people like it or absolutely hate it. This echoes pretty closely with the “cultish” nature of films by Hitchcock. I obviously was thinking of that connection.
Serena, what Kubrick movies would you recommend? I surely need to catch-up.
by Sunny on August 27 2004, 10:08 am #
I haven’t seen too many of his films either, but 2001 is really great. So is A Clockwork Orange. I’m not sure what is considered to be his best work, but those two are probably two of his most famous. Actually all his movies are pretty famous now that I think about it. The Shining, Full Metal Jacket, and Dr. Strange Love are all also quite notorious.
I think Shyamalan is really one of the best directors to emerge in recent years.
by ramanan on August 27 2004, 5:48 pm #
Sunny, ram just proved my point about love or hate.
See, actually, I’m in the hate category. I greatly admire what Kubrick did, I think he had vision and was a great artist but quite frankly of the movies I’ve seen of his (which isn’t that many), I’ve hated more of them than I liked.
I’ve seen A Clockwork Orange, Lolita, 2001, and Eyes Wide Shut – so as you can see, I also need to catch up. I don’t consider AI really a Kubrick movie because it was shot by Spielberg and took less than 10 years to make. Actually I liked AI and as far as I know, Kubrick never intended to film it himself but wanted to make a movie with those ideas in it but wanted Spielberg to actually shoot the project in consultation with him (Kubrick).
Before I get blasted for not liking most of the Kubrick movies I’ve seen, I’ve gotta tack on a disclaimer – a lot of it might have to do with how much I loved the two books – A Clockwork Orange (Anthony Burgess) and Lolita (Nabakov), and yes, I know Lolita was shot in consultation with Nabakov but what I truly disliked about those two movies was how much it misses from the books and with Lolita in particular, how completely different the tone of the movie is.
I did like Eyes Wide Shut, but then again I never read the story first.
2001.. I never made it all the way through the book and I admired what he did with the movie but quite frankly it bored me to sleep (quite literally).
So… in conclusion, I’m not the best person to recommend Kubrick movies. I would say just from comments I’ve heard, The Shining and Dr. Strange Love would be good candidates for Kubrick movies that’d be worth watching.
by serena on August 30 2004, 8:45 pm #