Leave your expectations at the door

Rating: 9/10 (6 August 2019)

Sometimes a film suffers cruelly from viewer expectations. This is such a film. But I can't lay all the blame at the viewers' feet. A lion's share of the blame belongs, I think, to its marketing people. The Village was advertised as a horror film. It is not. At its heart, this film is both a tenderly executed love story and a thoughtful morality fable. The Village hits upon a hidden desire within many of us to escape the hectic, dangerous modern world and live a simpler, more tranquil life. It speaks of a love kindled between two young people who have grown up as chums and who, on the cusp of adulthood, discover their feelings for each other run deeper than friendship. It shows how one man's love for his wife tempers and restrains his love for another woman. And it warns that we may succeed in fleeing the evils in the world, but we cannot escape the evil within ourselves. The twist came as a surprise to me personally because I really wasn't looking for it. I was too busy watching the movie. Perhaps if critics had simply done that, they wouldn't have given this film such bad reviews. The Village is cerebral, heartfelt, and, yes, leisurely in its pace-intentionally so. If you're looking for an endless stream of jump scares and fast-paced adventure, this is not the film for you.