a parable about all the VILLAGEs
semi-spoilers included
I've not talked about The Village all summer even though I've often thought that I had a lot to say.
I'll start with the relevant pre-review-admissions: 1.) I went in expecting to LIKE not LOVE it, but 2.) a fan of M. Night, nonetheless, 3.) I've always been convinced that Unbreakable is the best work he's done yet...even though I like all the other stuff.
Okay. That out of the way, I really only have two things to say.
1. This is a good film, because its one of the best PARABLES about ENCLAVES that I've seen in forever. Isolationism is dangerous. Integration is inevitable. At the beginning of the film, I said to myself: This would be the best parable about fundamentalism EVER except in fundamentalism, the monsters in the woods aren't real. The leaders of the Villages make them up to coerce obedience. So...you can imagine how much MORE i liked the Parable-ness of the movie later...
2. The twists in this movie aren't the payoff. The way that you writhe on the questions of the twists is the payoff. M. Night amazingly uses all the grammar he's set up (color codes is the best, most obvious example) to lure you into elaborate questions which are about trusting him as an author -- while still managing to stay in the story emotionally. And don't tell me that "the" twist wasn't that great. There are at least three major twists in this movie. ANd I agree, the last one isn't great. But the other ones are.
It just seems like we NEED more parables about life in enclaves. We all live in them. When I was just emerging from fundamentalism, I didn't know that. I thought I was the only freakish one who lived in a cut-off way from society. But it turns out that relatively limited spheres of knowledge and relationships are the normative way of being human. The most manageable survivable way to be human....but if you're reading this blog...I think you care about the QUESTION of:
How do we both LIVE IN (affirming) our enclaves, while striving to make them permeable...to, ask William Hurt's character says: Take Risks?
I've not talked about The Village all summer even though I've often thought that I had a lot to say.
I'll start with the relevant pre-review-admissions: 1.) I went in expecting to LIKE not LOVE it, but 2.) a fan of M. Night, nonetheless, 3.) I've always been convinced that Unbreakable is the best work he's done yet...even though I like all the other stuff.
Okay. That out of the way, I really only have two things to say.
1. This is a good film, because its one of the best PARABLES about ENCLAVES that I've seen in forever. Isolationism is dangerous. Integration is inevitable. At the beginning of the film, I said to myself: This would be the best parable about fundamentalism EVER except in fundamentalism, the monsters in the woods aren't real. The leaders of the Villages make them up to coerce obedience. So...you can imagine how much MORE i liked the Parable-ness of the movie later...
2. The twists in this movie aren't the payoff. The way that you writhe on the questions of the twists is the payoff. M. Night amazingly uses all the grammar he's set up (color codes is the best, most obvious example) to lure you into elaborate questions which are about trusting him as an author -- while still managing to stay in the story emotionally. And don't tell me that "the" twist wasn't that great. There are at least three major twists in this movie. ANd I agree, the last one isn't great. But the other ones are.
It just seems like we NEED more parables about life in enclaves. We all live in them. When I was just emerging from fundamentalism, I didn't know that. I thought I was the only freakish one who lived in a cut-off way from society. But it turns out that relatively limited spheres of knowledge and relationships are the normative way of being human. The most manageable survivable way to be human....but if you're reading this blog...I think you care about the QUESTION of:
How do we both LIVE IN (affirming) our enclaves, while striving to make them permeable...to, ask William Hurt's character says: Take Risks?
posted by Redbaerd at 10:43 AM
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