The Village Backlash Thread (Spoilers - But hey, don't waste your money!)

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Dan said:
I love how Mike Works' description of how to change the movie is pretty much the following: The Village would have been better if it were The Sixth Sense. I don't know, I saw The Sixth Sense back in 1999. If I wanted to see it again, I have it on DVD. I'd much prefer to see something different than the same formula again.

I don't know, I knew the ending going into the film and had major reservations about it, but I thought the film worked really well. I think some of you have just been convincing yourselves for the past several months that this would suck. Plus, there's always that crowd that has to hate on things that lots of people think are good because that somehow elevates their own taste, or some bullshit like that.
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That's not what I wanted at all. I didn't want the village to be the Sixth Sense. In fact, I didn't change one thing in the entire movie, short of actually showing the medicine. ALL I changed was the sequence of events.

And rearranging the order of certain scenes in order to give the surprises a sensible conquest of impact doesn't turn the movie into the Sixth Sense. If it was revealed that Donald Sutherland had been replaced in Invasion of the Body Snatches 3 quarters into the film, it would hurt the film. Generally, when you have a surprise twist, you unveil it at the end, unless the film uses it as a crutch to continue on. This was not the case for The Village, and thus the editing job did nothing but seriously detract from the potential enjoyment of the movie.

(IMO DUDERS)
 
yo i want to read impressions but im afraid they are littered with spoilers un marked......


so far i have read this much accidently:


elders tricking people

and some noah dude dressed up in a suit...



do i know too much or will i still be surprised by the twist?
 
effzee said:
yo i want to read impressions but im afraid they are littered with spoilers un marked......


so far i have read this much accidently:


elders tricking people

and some noah dude dressed up in a suit...



do i know too much or will i still be surprised by the twist?
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umm... I dont wanna comment on that
 
shit i was trying my best to avoid everything about this movie b4 seeing it but only came in to see the impressions and accidently read some stuff.



damn damn damn.
 
effzee said:
yo i want to read impressions but im afraid they are littered with spoilers un marked......


so far i have read this much accidently:


elders tricking people

and some noah dude dressed up in a suit...



do i know too much or will i still be surprised by the twist?
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Put a fork in it, this movie is done for you.
 
lol, you know too much. The movie is ruined unless your retarted.


Anyways, Im still thinking on whether not I liked this movie or not. I was sort of looking forward to the plot that was given to us through the trailiers and the first half of the movie. But what did occur(made you think of human behavior and such) was interesting enough to where it was worth the money and time.
 
My one problem is that, even though the people of the village decided to live a better life by being old fashioned... that didnt really need to "change the date"... on the grave it says 1897, this is unneccesary because the date should have no effect on people's actions... if the other people of the village thought that was the way to act, they would do it whether or not its 1800 or 2004. That is only in there to keep up the illusion for the audience... really not a big deal, just bothered me.
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They didn't need to, but it does affect the psychology of the elders. Anything reminding them of the modern world is a thing that has to be locked away.

effzee: The thread did say spoilers in it's subject line. The raping of the midgets is not a big spoiler, it just ruins a joke in the movie, that's all.
 
I just saw the movie also in the theaters and I watched it fully aware of the hate that is being tossed around the net. And I thought it was ok. Though I was expecting a whole lot before the negative impressions and if I did go in with those high expectations then I would have been disappointed. A whole lot. I loved Signs and Sixth Sense like almost all of you guys lol and thought Unbreakable is great also but The Village is just too average for me. =\
 
The movie was good.

About the jet plan trails....those people have no knowledge of planes. They believe there are fucking porcupine looking creatures in the woods. You tell them it's the jet trails are clouds and that point is moot.

Honestly I think it was meant as two twists. The first twisit being that they are living isolated from society, regardless of time era. The second twist that it's happening in modern day. That's to me seems to be the reason for "revealing" the twist early.

As for "I knew the ending before I saw the popcorn and coke ad". Go suck a dick. There's no way you could have known specifics. I'm sure everybody thought it might be possible that was the ending. Just like everybody thought it was possible they're really were monsters in the woods. If you knew about the construction worker "spoiler", eat two dicks.
 
muncheese said:
The movie was good.

About the jet plan trails....those people have no knowledge of planes. They believe there are fucking porcupine looking creatures in the woods. You tell them it's the jet trails are clouds and that point is moot.

Honestly I think it was meant as two twists. The first twisit being that they are living isolated from society, regardless of time era. The second twist that it's happening in modern day. That's to me seems to be the reason for "revealing" the twist early.

As for "I knew the ending before I saw the popcorn and coke ad". Go suck a dick. There's no way you could have known specifics. I'm sure everybody thought it might be possible that was the ending. Just like everybody thought it was possible they're really were monsters in the woods. If you knew about the construction worker "spoiler", eat two dicks.
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SOMEONE PLEASE SHOW ME EARLY SPOILERS OF THIS MOVIE... like this one!!!
 
KarishBHR said:
My one problem is that, even though the people of the village decided to live a better life by being old fashioned... that didnt really need to "change the date"... on the grave it says 1897, this is unneccesary because the date should have no effect on people's actions... if the other people of the village thought that was the way to act, they would do it whether or not its 1800 or 2004. That is only in there to keep up the illusion for the audience... really not a big deal, just bothered me.
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Don't forget that Walker's son is a history professor. During the 'revelation' when the starts off "I have an idea..." I'm sure it follows with something similar to "...lets go back and live as these simple people did back when the world was innocent, lets toss away everything and actually live in that period.... blah blah blah, etc." It would be the same reason why they aren't walking around in Levi's and such. They would have reverted entirely back to this farming society.

Anyways I almost wished that one of those newspaper headlines would have been that war or plague broke out and everything out there was a wasteland and that the creatures WERE real, a result of what had happened. Would have been more interesting that what he provided.

Its funny too, because I didn't recall seeing a date on the grave. If I would have paid attention to that, perhaps I would not have arrived to my conclusion about them being in modern times :)
 
effzee said:
yo i want to read impressions but im afraid they are littered with spoilers un marked......


so far i have read this much accidently:


elders tricking people

and some noah dude dressed up in a suit...



do i know too much or will i still be surprised by the twist?
Click to expand...

Dude, why would you try to get impressions from a thread labelled "Spoilers"?
 
I loved the movie, even with prior knowledge of the entire storyline and ending. It's far more subtle than Shyamalan's previous work, almost entirely independent of his trademark twists, instead focusing on a rather romantic story that is - and I hesitiate to say this - somewhat burdened by the now-expected curveball he throws the audience. Much like Unbreakable, this is not a picture with mainstream appeal, and the box office will likely reflect this in the end (although I imagine it will still far surpass what Unbreakable pulled in).

Acting was solid throughout, with a good performance by Joaquin Phoenix despite having no more than a handful of lines; however, Bryce Dallas Howard clearly steals every scene she's in. I'm definitely looking forward to seeing her in more movies.

Roger Deakins' cinematography also deserves to be mentioned. This is a stunningly shot film, with countless images that are just perfect in their framing and composition, and excellent usage of color.

Yes, some editing changes and scene shuffling could've improved the overall flow of things, but I was enjoying myself too much to really be bothered by it. Not M. Night's best effort, but I'd still rate it an A- without hesitation.
 
Hotarubi said:
I loved the movie, even with prior knowledge of the entire storyline and ending. It's far more subtle than Shyamalan's previous work, almost entirely independent of his trademark twists, instead focusing on a rather romantic story that is - and I hesitiate to say this - somewhat burdened by the now-expected curveball he throws the audience. Much like Unbreakable, this is not a picture with mainstream appeal, and the box office will likely reflect this in the end (although I imagine it will still far surpass what Unbreakable pulled in).
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He must have 'reached me' because I thought Unbreakable was excellent AND mainstream. It was just overall a well done film. I guess perhaps I don't understand the definition of a 'mainstream' audience. Shindler's List was less 'mainstream' than Unbreakable :)
 
Meh, it wasn't bad. I think the critics are spooging themselves in delight over this one b/c it's a movie that dares to deliver something other than what its been pitched as in the commercials. Well, someone should remind them that Signs sucked equallu as bad in that regard. I hated Signs with a passion. I liked this one a bit.

Say what you will, but Shyamalan's movies are shot well, and generally acted well. The Village is no different IMO. Good work on both fronts. What annoys me is probably what annoyed everyone else, the way the lie was just dismantled so readily to reveal a rather unexpected ending. But I'm not so overzealous as to hang the whole movie b/c it didn't end the way I wanted it to. I figure Shymalan wanted irony, and that's what we got. I figured it out once they'd shown that the monster was fake. That meant they had to be hiding something, and I was fully expecting them to take out old credit cards and drivers licenses from the safe boxes. Just a bunch of bereaved hippies who wanted to escape. It's The Beach meets The Others IMO. Took the better parts from both, changed the setting and then relied on camera tricks and pacing to keep you guessing.

At the end of the movie, me and my sister chuckled, shook our heads and walked out. It's not what I expected. It's not really a horror movie, or even scary. But it's an interesting enough story that's told well, whether you liked the way it ended or not. I think expectations are writing these reviews. On merit, it's not that bad. PEACE.
 
MrCheez: I don't think Noah was always the monster. Ivy's dad mentioned this I think. They did the markings and used the suit to scare the villagers. I think they did it whenever it seemed like someone might want to venture out. To scare them back. It only attacked the village after Lucious ventures into the woods and tells them about it. It never attacked when Noah did, b/c no one else knew he went in there until Lucious found out. The noises were probably various elders at various times just keeping up the charade so the villagers would always remember. That's my take on it at least. PEACE.
 
You're right, but I actually meant at the very end of the movie though, when he was chasing Ivy.

He was making grunts and a few quick roars that could not have been made by a human.
 
MrCheez said:
You're right, but I actually meant at the very end of the movie though, when he was chasing Ivy.

He was making grunts and a few quick roars that could not have been made by a human.
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good point, I was wondering the same thing
 
Or he could have been making it himself...as he's playing along with the role of being a beast. I don't think a deaf person who requires her hearing more than most people would suddenly imagine noises.
 
Wait... can we please clear one thing up THAT WE ALL CAN AGREE ON?


The girl who played Ivy (Howard), has amazing talent, and will have a very bright future in hollywood?
 
I dunno...I saw a bit of her on Leno (like 2 seconds) and she reminded me of one of the Androids from Blade Runner. Y'know, the one that shook around a lot when she was shot.
 
Hmm, close... I would say...

Unbreakable > Sixth Sense > (Signs = The Village)

=)
 
Fight for Freeform said:
Or he could have been making it himself
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Yeah, but I just don't think a person could make those kind of noises. =/ The closest thing it sounded to was a lion.

I guess it's not a big deal, just bugged me. I had a really good idea it was Noah during that scene but I got all hopeful and thought "Woah, maybe it's a real monster since it's making those noises!" =P
 
Here are my two cents.

First off, I am a huge M. Knight Shyamalan fan. I loved the Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and The Signs. Both movies always provided me a few shocks and twists alongside several provoking ideas about human nature. Not only are his movies great, but each time he comes out with a new one, you are dealing with a smarter audience who is not only trying to figure out your trademark twist before you reveal it, but also are expecting to be "shocked" once again, perhaps to a higher degree since after each movie the viewer are sort of building an M. Knight callus. The M. Knight callus is why a good movie like "The Others" couldn't really have the impact because M. Knight already exposed that sensation to the audience.

Internet " nerds/critics" are always going to attack something out there. I just think it's ridiculous to call something like the village "a stupid concept", "terribly written", or "a waste of 9 dollars". Hyperbole+ignorance = does not make your opinion credible to me. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but some of you need a reality check.

But now to the village.

I can't say I love the movie as much as the other three, but I definitely liked it. The other movies have had multiple viewings and time of me thinking about to them to get to their respected levels. I think The Village was a great movie. One of the most profound concepts to me is that there is no way to get rid of crime and evil. You can put people in a secluded simple environment without money which was considered the strongest root of evil, but greed is only one of the many human emotions that cause us to do inordinary things. Knight concentrates on people's reaction to love in several interesting ways. Remember how Ivy figured out Lucious loved her, because he would touch other people without thinking about it (grabbing their hand), but he would not touch Ivy because he was scared she would figure out he was attracted to her. This same example is carried on with Lucious' mom and Ivy's father. Noah of course kills Lucious (a scene no one saw coming) because of jealousy. This scene is very powerful because it shows you human nature creates sin. You can take away the materialistic nature of American society, but you can't take away jealous rage. Lucious was depicted as a kind and friendly person to Noah, but the second Noah finds out about Lucious and Ivy getting married, his jealousy takes over and causes him to murder (attempted) Lucious. None of these are new concepts of humanism that Knight is handfeeding us, but the way he shows us picture by picture, to me are like using familiar words in poetic sentences. Was noah going to hurt ivy at the end? I don't think anyone could say no. We are not 100% sure of his mannerism when he bears that suit, he is also still enfuriated by Ivy's actions. The village was a refuge to these people who suffered in the outside world. I can't imagine how someone functions in society if they found their loved one violently murdered in their house. The thing that makes this the usual M. Knight fare, is that it finds a way to realistically (by hollywood measures) to put your conscious in that world.

I'm thinking about the movie still. I can't wait to watch it again.

By the way. The next M. Knight movie after Signs I swore was the one he was writing about ouiji boards. I bet thats the next one.
 
What I don't get is why some critics are labeling the undertone of the film as having a "Liberal Message"
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Clearly liberals want nothing more than to move to the woods and have sex with their cousins. Hell, I've got my ticket reserved for Bumfuckville right now. ;) PEACE.
 
Fight for Freeform said:
I don't think a deaf person who requires her hearing more than most people would suddenly imagine noises.
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A deaf person who requires her hearing more than most people? Talk about being screwed.

Warm Machine said:
What I don't get is why some critics are labeling the undertone of the film as having a "Liberal Message"
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It's because of the end when the radio is talking about how 15 americans were killed in a convoy attack and the paper he's reading talks about casualities oversea's and such. You and I both know that it would take much less than that for a political party to get their panties in a bunch.

One thing I'd like to speak on is is how people are claiming that after creating this supposedly self-created utopian society, there is still violence and crime, it cannot be escaped.

Maybe I missed something, but the only violence/crime was created by a fucking retard. The retard stabbed Joquain, the retard skinned the animals, the retard attacked Ivy, and the retard fell into the pit and died. You can't evaluate the detriment of a society's values thanks to the works of one mentally handicapped person.
 
Mike Works said:
Maybe I missed something, but the only violence/crime was created by a fucking retard. The retard stabbed Joquain, the retard skinned the animals, the retard attacked Ivy, and the retard fell into the pit and died. You can't evaluate the detriment of a society's values thanks to the works of one mentally handicapped person.
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"The retard", as you so politely describe him, only did two things: stab Lucius and chase Ivy. There is no evidence whatsoever to indicate that Noah had anything to do with the monsters before he found the costume in the silent room and ran off into the woods to find Ivy. It seems far more likely that the culprits who did the mass livestock killing were rogue members of the elders taking things into their own hands. Having Noah be involved just makes no sense at all.

I'll grant you the fact that it was the mentally challenged person who commits the only crime, as I was going to point out the same thing to Ninja. I'd say that weakens the film's point a bit, but at least the crime still blatantly stemmed from jealousy and not just some meltdown or random moment of aggression of Noah's.
 
Sorry, when I talked about her hearing I meant that it's something she's trained and uses a lot to navigate. She wouldn't start hearing sounds in her head for no reason, as she couldn't see the monster.

Maybe I missed something, but the only violence/crime was created by a fucking retard. The retard stabbed Joquain, the retard skinned the animals, the retard attacked Ivy, and the retard fell into the pit and died. You can't evaluate the detriment of a society's values thanks to the works of one mentally handicapped person.
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Waaait a minute, I thought the elders did the skinning. All Noah did was kill Lucious.

Noah was the type of person who'd do something without thinking about it beforehand. Very emotional and reactive. I see it as a different kind of crime, because most crimes are premeditated, while in this case it as a sudden knee jerk reaction. But it does go to show that jealousy and feelings that could cause hate and anger did exist in the Village.

You have to admit, besides F9/11, there is no other recent movie that could garner this kind of discussion. Well, maybe there is, I just haven't seen them yet. :P
 
One thing I'd like to speak on is is how people are claiming that after creating this supposedly self-created utopian society, there is still violence and crime, it cannot be escaped.

Maybe I missed something, but the only violence/crime was created by a fucking retard
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Consider these two points.

(1) Where did this "retard" come from? He didn't come from outer space, and he wasn't transported from Loonyville Hospital. He was a natural product of the village. Just like he was born there, he could have been born in the city. It's the unaccountable probability.

(2) Him being retarded, doesn't change the fact that a natural human emotion (jealousy in this case) can lead to murder. OJ was considered a civil guy for several decades before his coupe de grace.
 
Shikamaru Ninja said:
(1) Where did this "retard" come from? He didn't come from outer space, and he wasn't transported from Loonyville Hospital. He was a natural product of the village. Just like he was born there, he could have been born in the city. It's the unaccountable probability.
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Yes, but to play devil's advocate, you could take the lesson to be something as simple as the mentally challenged should be locked up and not allowed to interact with the rest of society. He was the one who couldn't control his emotions. The film doesn't show someone who was civil for decades like OJ then snap and do something violent. Rather, the only guy seen doing anything violent in the entire film is the one with a mental handicap. Noah was the one hitting people with a stick and Noah was the one to stab Lucius. He's also the one to crash through a window and find Ivy in the woods.

The elders ignore his disability and just feel that they may not be able to run from crime forever, but the film doesn't make as a strong a case to the audience as the elders believe.

(2) Him being retarded, doesn't change the fact that a natural human emotion (jealousy in this case) can lead to murder.
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Unfortunately, as I like this film, I'd say it very much does change that fact. It was made rather clear that Noah had an extremely difficult time controlling his emotions and actions. He hit people with sticks, and as I recall it was stated he was doing so "again". It was made clear that he'd been to the silent room a number of times. At most I'd say the film raises the point that jealousy can be found in anyone, but I'm not sure it crosses that and says that it can lead to violent actions in anyone, merely the mentally handicapped. There wasn't any other evidence of violent actions by anyone within the village, that I can remember.

Then again, I also find Noah's entire mental capacity to be in question. He's shown to be a man who does his own thing despite being told otherwise. He doesn't seem terribly bright. However, he then manages to find the Those We Don't Speak Of costume, break through the window, and run off to find Ivy in the woods, whom he didn't even know had been sent out there. That's the thing I can't figure out. Is that a plot hole or is that on purpose? Or did Noah just chance upon Ivy while playing creature in the costume?
 
Dan said:
There is no evidence whatsoever to indicate that Noah had anything to do with the monsters before he found the costume in the silent room and ran off into the woods to find Ivy. It seems far more likely that the culprits who did the mass livestock killing were rogue members of the elders taking things into their own hands. Having Noah be involved just makes no sense at all.
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I'm fairly certain it was Noah (Hurt refers to the person responsible in a manner that it was one person, and he doesn't quite know who it was, but he'll make sure it doesn't happen again). There are 3 big threads on Something Awful's forums regarding the movie, and the opinion/conclusion that Noah was the one who skinned the animals is pretty much universal.
 
Isn't there a scene between Hurt and Sigourney afer the major skinning happens where the two of them are genuinely concerned about it? If so it would seem none of the elders did it so it had to be Noah.
 
Isn't there a scene between Hurt and Sigourney afer the major skinning happens where the two of them are genuinely concerned about it? If so it would seem none of the elders did it so it had to be Noah.
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My impression is that they were concerned that they went too far in scaring people.

But I'll try to read some of those SA threads...

-edit-

added "were concerned that they"...like I said...I'm braindead. Not getting much work done...gonna see if people are playing street hockey... :P
 
Warm Machine said:
Isn't there a scene between Hurt and Sigourney afer the major skinning happens where the two of them are genuinely concerned about it? If so it would seem none of the elders did it so it had to be Noah.
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Who says Hurt and Weaver knew what the other elders were up to? Hell, Hurt could have easily gotten away with sending his daughter into the woods without anyone else knowing for quite some time. Instead he quickly fessed up. The other elders could have kept their own actions a secret very easily.

The only thing that's bugging me is that I can't remember seeing Noah at the wedding reception. But then, if Noah did the skinnings, that only emphasises the issue that Noah is the only bad seed in the village, and he just so happens to be mentally handicapped. That's why I have a hard time believing that Noah did the skinnings. It completely undermines the point Shyamalan was trying to make...

Mike Works - I can't seem to find the debate on Noah and the skinnings at Something Awful. Do you have a direct link or quotes?

I'm curious if anyone can answer my other question above, how did Noah know Ivy had been sent into the woods? Or did he not know?
 
Okay, I just saw this movie a little while ago and I have just one question: How could anyone not see that ending coming? There were obvious hints, to me anyway, starting in the very beginning of the movie. I did not read any spoilers anywhere; I did not read any reviews. To me, that was the biggest disappointment, that I knew the ending the whole movie and just had to wait around to see if I was right and when it would happen.

I was thinking within the first 20 minutes: "Ok, the townspeople keep talking about something bad that happened to a loved one in 'the towns'... This is probably some freaking fantasy camp for people that want to be stuck in the 1800's to escape the pain of modern day reality. Whoopee."

I thought, well let's see, maybe the creatures are really people dressed up in some stupid costumes to prevent people from leaving the woods and finding out the truth. Then there were the not-so-subtle messages about money, and how it brings men to evil, blah, blah, blah. The only part that kind of had me wondering was after she was told how the creatures were fake, then there's another creature chasing her around. I just didn't figure it was Noah. Ok, so there was one twist I didn't see, though in retrospect, that was also incredibly trite.

Interesting movie, especially if you really didn't get it until the box was opened, but altogether it was quite weak. No decent scares, a total letdown ending, and not too much decent acting to be found, besides the characters of Ivy and Lucious.
 
Mike Works said:
There are 3 threads off the top of my head. Just go into GBS and set the filter to movies, they should all be on the front page.
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Eh, I'm not registered there so I can't search, and I only found two threads within the first 10 pages of the General Bullshit forum. Of those two threads I saw one post that mentioned there being bones in the hidden section of the silent room. I vaguely recall seeing bones, but for some reason thinking it was a part of the creature costume. I'm also not quite sure how that's evidence of Noah skinning the animals, as they were skinned, not torn apart with missing bones.

I don't know, if Noah did all of that stuff, the movie really hurts its own message. It ends up being something closer to, "we can build a utopia as long as we don't have any mentally handicapped people." On the other hand, I'm still not even entirely convinced that Noah was as incapable as the film made him out to be. It certainly wouldn't make sense for him to be able to know Ivy was out in the woods looking for the towns.
 
I was sorely disappointed by The Village. It's just a ripoff of an old Twilight Zone ep. But, I haven't been too disappointed- 3 good movies (Napoleon Dynamite, Zatoichi, and Monster) versus two not bad movies (The Village and The Bourne Supremacy) isn't a bad deal. I'm kind of reluctant to see Harold and Kumar. I don't think I can take more non-rocking movie going experiences this week.

Edit: Those We Do Not Speak Of were done very nicely. Shmalayan always does good with the monsters.
 
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