"The Village" Official Spoiler Thread

[jonas]

As I left the theatre I heard one teenager male state 'That was pointless and made no sense.'

Some people seem to be COMPLETELY ripping this movie to shreds, almost to the point where you are picking apart really stupid things like 'OMG WHY CAN SHE SEE CLOURLR!!!11 HAHA I DRINK BEER'.

I dunno. As I said. You cannot go into M Night not liking his other movies and expect to like this one. You just can't do that.

I find older people enjoy his movies more than the under 20 or so age group.
I wonder why.

[Timber]

I dunno. As I said. You cannot go into M Night not liking his other movies and expect to like this one. You just can't do that.

And you also can't go into a new M Night flcik expecting to like it just because you loved his first three flims. I loved everything he's done up until now.

[jonas]

Actually I did just that.

Seemingly, I read no reviews or anything that could have spoiled or given any part of the 'twist' away. I find that is much more enjoyable and I think if I had read them, it would have immediately ruined the movie. Why even bother when you already know the best part.


If you honestly loved his first three films and you didn't like this one, I find that kind of hard to believe.
Did you really 'love' them or did you just 'like' them.

[sean126]

And when Sigorney Weaver was telling her characters backstory, she says her husband was beat up in an alley and dumped into a river. She said "alleyway" which didn't seem right to me. I'm not sure if it was on purpose, but I consider alleyways a city thing. It didn't look like there were any buildings in the village close enough together to really be considered an alleyway. And at that point in the story I wasn't sure where she was talking about. Did it happen in that village or somewhere else?

Well it definitly didn't happen in the village because they fleed the towns because of these events. That may be enough evidence to cause someone to think "something is not right here" but if you guessed "These people actually live in modern times" off of those couple of discrepancies, then you have much better skills of inference than I do.

BUT LISTEN TO THIS -

What if the film went like this to make the twist work... Let's say early on in the film it is revealed that the monsters are a hoax. The elders are screwed, the town feels betrayed, people are getting ready to leave. Just then odd things begin to happen. Maybe different noises are heard at night, someone starts a fire at the outskirts of the village, etc. It is believed by all that something is out there.

Maybe over the course of the film, Ivy picks up a lighter or something that obviously didn't exist back then. She doesn't know what it is, the elders catch her, and then the climax results with the villagers catching who has been up to the mischief - outsiders from the real world - the film could have ended like that.

I want to be a filmmaker some day. Figured I'd give the rewrite a try!

[Prince Planet]

Seemingly, I read no reviews or anything that could have spoiled or given any part of the 'twist' away. I find that is much more enjoyable and I think if I had read them, it would have immediately ruined the movie. Why even bother when you already know the best part.

I saw it last night, free of any spoiler-taint. A few clever, tense moments, and overall a pretty fun movie. Still, I can easily see how people would be disappointed, or otherwise come away feeling abused by the seemingly endless gimmicks of M. Night Shamalamadingdong.

[sethsez]

Actually I did just that.

Seemingly, I read no reviews or anything that could have spoiled or given any part of the 'twist' away. I find that is much more enjoyable and I think if I had read them, it would have immediately ruined the movie. Why even bother when you already know the best part.


If you honestly loved his first three films and you didn't like this one, I find that kind of hard to believe.
Did you really 'love' them or did you just 'like' them.

The twists were never the best parts of his other movies. I loved his other films because he wrote very compelling characters that made the movies rewatchable long after I knew the twist. The Village doesn't have any compelling characters so I feel no urge to see it again, ever.

[BioMechanic]

Saw it yesterday sans spoilers, didn't care for it much. Seemed like much of Night's camera magic was missing - perhaps intentionally. It wasn't as atmospheric or visually beautiful as Unbreakable or Signs - the film was rather bleak and ugly. But the soundtrack was excellent, and we'll be seeing more from Bryce Howard.

It says something when the most believable character in the film is the village idiot who is only partly aware of what's going on. What a waste of a wonderful cast. I do agree that the dialogue was intentionally poor, but the reasons for it being that way were pointless.

The Village tried really hard to be a thriller, but I felt zero tension. It tried to be a love story, but the characters were so thinly developed I felt detached.

As for the twist, it was totally pointless. The film didn't need it, and would have been better if it had been completely omitted. Night tried too hard to be clever and reached a bit too far, which brought the whole plot and mood crashing down. The Village could have been - should have been - much better than it was. It had an intruiging concept, but ended up just being silly because the plot was overexplained and because Night couldn't decide what kind of movie he wanted to make.

I also think the previews and advertising completely misrepresent the film. It's not surprising people are getting their expectations crushed.

[Mzo]

If you honestly loved his first three films and you didn't like this one, I find that kind of hard to believe.
Did you really 'love' them or did you just 'like' them.

No one really loves him like you do.

I thought the 6th Sense was very good, but Unbreakable and Signs were pretty meh. I'm going to give this one a pass.

[mollipen]

My movie would be porn.
$100,000,000 porn.
Imagine...

Not sure we're thinking along the same lines, but I've always wanted to see a big budget, taken seriously porn movie. A movie that actually worked hard to have a real, decent story, and that had actors that could actually act worth a damn.

Sure, my movie would probably end up sucking, but I'd love the chance to attempt making one. I've got so many ideas stuck in my head that I could use.

Shidoshi- You think Ivy was hot? Talk about a Sarah Plain and Tall. No quality features on that girl what so ever.

She was a cute redhead. I dunno, that's enough for me.

And Noah taking that suit doesn't make much sense either. Sure he's retarded but he knew Ivy was pissed at him, why would he chase her and shit like that? I don't like the "because he's retarded" route because it's too stupid and convinant. And I dont think anyone can say that this flick got pretty boring at times.

I think people are over-extending the extent of Noah's retardation. He was a little messed up, but I don't think it was to a serious enough extent that he couldn't function as a human being. He obviously knew what he was doing when he killed Luscious, he obviously knew enough about what he had done to feel regret afterward. He loved Ivy, she came in and slapped the shit out of him, he was hurt and realized that he could never have her, he got pissed and decided to go hurt her like he had Luscious. I think his condition made him more child-like: he might not totally understand everything going on, he cares more about having fun than worrying about grown-up types of things, and he doesn't have full capacity for understanding the results of his actions. We see a lot of examples of children being able to think out more adult actions yet not fully understanding the result of said actions.

[aren]

I saw the movie last night, but I was too tired to right a review then.

NO SPOILERS

M. Night Shyamalan's makes a Covington that is a 19th-century Pennsylvania village. But this isn’t a regular village. It has a "gentle understanding" with the mystical creatures of the surrounding woods: no villager steps into the forest and the creatures stay outside the village. Things start to unfold as secrets are reviled that there is more to these creatures than meets the eye.

It seems everyone was expecting so much going into this film and they were letdown for whatever reason. M. Night Shyamalan had the right idea: a unique plot, a talented cast, and the right atmosphere to match the movie, but the way he developed the film wasn’t done well.

The performance by every single cast member was really stunning. Bryce Dallas Howard (Ivy Walker), Joaquin Phoenix (Lucius Hunt), Adrien Brody (Noah Percy) and the rest of the cast had a great chemistry together which worked out well in the end. The chemistry between Bryce Dallas Howard and Joaquin Phoenix stood out in my mind as an overwhelming love story that worked out well in the end. This was a huge plus for the film.

M. Night Shyamalan did an excellent job with the environment which really gave it the perfect mood. I also give him credit for delivering a twist that I highly doubt anyone suspected. Sure, there were flaws and plot holes, but with M. Night Shyamalan’s style of directing you could look past these flaws and plot holes and still get a great film of it unless you like to rip apart films, which you could do to any film.

In the end, M. Night Shyamalan made a film that’s making people have great discussion over as far as the story and idea goes. The cast, story, environment, and even the humor mixed together to give us an enjoyable movie. It surely wasn’t his best work ever, but for what it was, it was a great film, and I was satisfied with the end result.

Story: A+
Acting: A-
Visuals: B
Cinematography: B
Overall: B- (Not an average)