Sidebar: this movie is also fascinating because M. Night Shyamalan decided while filming it to simultaneously and secretly produce a fake documentary about himself called The Buried Secrets of M. Night Shyamalan. The premise of the documentary is that Nathaniel Kahn, a real documentary filmmaker, was making an unauthorized documentary about Shyamalan and the making of The Village, but then from a really sketchy chat room discovers that Shyamalan actually communes with the dead. As you might have guessed, this “documentary” was not well received. Syfy, the network that aired The Buried Secrets of M. Night Shyamalan in 2004 right after The Village opened, had convinced media outlets that the documentary was real. It was subsequently leaked that it was staged and Syfy had to make a public apology. The ridiculously egocentric-ness of the documentary, added to the poor reception to The Village deeply tarnished Shyamalan’s reputation as a serious artist. End sidebar.
However, The Village is one Shyamalan’s most interesting endevours even just considering the film itself. First off, it is his first movie (not counting Praying with Anger because that was basically just a glorified school project) to not have a child as a main character. This is a pretty big departure for him as most of his movies since have also focused on children. Instead, the movie centers on trusted Shyamalan player, Joaquin Phoenix, as Lucius Hunt, a socially awkward young man who wants to leave the village in search of new medicine that would save the lives of the people in this village with no medicine. Perhaps the even bigger lead, though, is Bryce Dallas Howard in her first ever leading role as Ivy Walker, the blind daughter of the chief elder, Edward Walker, played by William Hurt. As if William Hurt was not a big enough name, Lucius’ mother, Alice is played by Sigourney Weaver and the character of Noah Percy is played by Adrian Brody who had just won the Best Actor Oscar for his heartbreaking performance in The Pianist.
Noah Percy is a hard character to talk about because of how offensively the character is written. It is clearly telegraphed that he has a developmental and learning disability. On its own, that would be fine, but the plot uses his disability to justify extremely violent behavior that is more in line with the behavior of a sociopath than a person with a developmental disability. Unfortunately, that is not the only logic plot hole in the movie, it is just the most manipulative and damning one. A highlight reel of the most absurd and confusing machinations of this ill-advised script would have to include the “monsters” which are revealed to actually just be the town elders trying to scare anyone from leaving. They are incredibly unconvincing and clearly just people with scary masks on. Also, I doubt none of the other characters ever noticed that every time the monsters attacked the village none of the elders could be found.
Perhaps even more ludicrous is the twist, which was almost universally hated at the time of its release. Basically, the film’s second half involves Ivy and Lucious falling in love and deciding to get married. Noah getting jealous and stabing Lucius, in what is definitely the best and most erotic stabbing scene in cinematic history. Ivy demanding to leave the village to get medicine to save Lucious and her father then reveals to her that the monsters are fake and agreeing to let her go, much to the chagrin of the other elders. She then gets sent into the woods by herself. Reminder: she is blind, so it is honestly a wonder she makes it through the forest at all.
Then, she is attacked by a monster. Oh no, could the monster’s actually be real? No, of course not, it is just Noah who has stolen one of the elder’s costumes and is terrorizing her for reasons that are incredibly unclear. However, Ivy does not know this, so she craftily gets him to fall into a pit, and the fall kills him. She treks on, though, and after climbing a wall that I have a hard time believing she could climb in her heavy 19th century skirt, we get our long-awaited twist: It is not the 19th century, but present day.
Flashbacks show that the elders created this village in a giant state park after all meeting in grief counseling and deciding that the world was too corrupt and that they could only find happiness by returning to a more innocent time. Meanwhile, Ivy begs a park security guard to get her medicine and in return gives him her father’s gold watch, and in perhaps an even bigger twist, he actually does. She then brings the medicine back and gives it to Lucious and he is saved. She also casually relays to the elders that she killed one of the monsters and they realize it must have been Noah. They are only a little sad, though, because now Ivy still believes the monsters are real and will never leave the village again. A happy ending for all!
But wait, does any of this make sense? Not really. These crazy people invented a society, so why couldn't they just have brought some medicine? Why did this village have to be so historically accurate? How did Lucius not die from his many stab wounds in what was at least a day that it Ivy took to get some penicillin? And, of course, my biggest question is: is this movie pro communism?
This movie has a lot of ideas going on, but its biggest hypothesis is that money = corruption = death. This newly minted society is all about the values of community and compassion and sharing, which are lovely values, but it also subverts values that are most integral to human nature, like individuality and freedom. While basically everything the citizens know is built on lies, this society is portrayed as much more a utopia than a dystopia. It is a new society and there is definitely a chance that it could all go to shit over time, but at the moment the plot examines, there is no classism in the village. There is no crime or poverty or inequality (as I’m sure you have guessed, though, everyone in this movie is white). There is also, somehow total food and water security. I guess they just stocked the park with enough animals or something.
The question remains: is this movie a representation of communism as Marx actually intended it? According to Marx, there would be a revolution led by the working class under the guidance of intellectuals. Then, the intellectuals would compose an equal society where everyone owns everything. This movie does not involve a revolution, but the people who left society seem to be generally working or middle class, and Elder Walker, who is the architect of the society, was a history professor, so there’s our overseeing intellectual. It is also true that in the village all means of production, services, and goods are shared.
There is also a strong anti-money approach in the village. We learn that Elder Walker was in grief counseling because his father was extremely wealthy and was murdered by his business partner over a money disagreement. This is definitely the strongest evidence for the money = corruption = death theory. It is also revealed that it was his father’s fortune that bought the park for them to start their community in, so I guess money is only okay if used to create a society with no money.
Despite Shyamalan’s best efforts to criticize capitalism and maybe comment on the destruction of innocence and rise of cynicism and fear after 9/11, this movie is not grounded enough in reality to make a believable argument for the adoption of Marxist principles.
Clearly this is not a film that stands up under any kind of close consideration, but I posit that it is still a largely enjoyable piece of entertainment. Maybe I am being generous because I know what horrors the next ten years of Shyamalan’s career will bring, but even as I was rolling my eyes at this movie, I was also enjoying its complete commitment to its absurd premise and attempt at deep social commentary.
