Coming on the heels of M. Night Shyamalan's hot-streak of The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and Signs, The Village was widely regarded as a failure. Fans and critics notably took issue with the movie's now-infamous twist ending. However, it's not the ending that harmed the overall integrity of the film. That crucial mistake came about halfway into the movie.
The Village follows an isolated 19th-century community plagued by menacing creatures that prey on the townspeople. Despite the constant threat, they try to go about their lives. Things are set into motion when the daughter of the village chief elder Ivy (Bryce Dallas Howard) falls in love with a man in town named Lucius (Joaquin Phoenix). Noah (Adrien Brody), a young man with a mental illness who is also in love with Ivy, stabs Lucius in a jealous rage. Following this, Ivy must venture out of the village and through the woods to find the medicine necessary to save Lucius's life.
Before she sets off, Ivy's father clues her in on a dangerous secret. The creatures never existed. Elders dress up in terrifying costumes to scare the younger residents into staying indoors and never leaving the village. Because if anyone left, it would reveal that they are actually living in the 21st century.
The Village's biggest mistake is a structural flaw. The Shyamalan film simply revealed the twist about elders dressing up in the costumes far too soon. The reveal comes early in the film, even before the halfway mark. This is before the crucial action of Ivy trekking through the forest to save Lucius. Spoiling the identity of the monsters took away any real tension from those sequences, as the audience has since learned that the threat isn't real. While one of the "monsters" does attempt to attack her during these scenes, the audience has no reason to be frightened, since it isn't real. In fact, Ivy even whispers that to herself during the showdown. The monster ends up being Noah, who would have likely never hurt her in the first place since he was in love with her. This fact highlights that Ivy was never really in danger after all.
This reveal should have been rolled into The Village's twist ending. The idea of a group of people coming together to reject the dangers of modern society is an interesting concept and had a lot of potential, but it came out of left field and was poorly executed. Both of The Village's major twists are connected, but introducing them so far apart in the horror movie weakens that connection. In turn, this decision made the movie less frightening and shocking on the whole. Saving the monster reveal until the elders' voiceover sequence in The Village's finale would've given some merit to the modern-day twist while still allowing Ivy's journey through the woods to remain a frightening and tense one.
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January 12, 2021 at 05:00AM
