Best Allegory in Response to 9/11 (Spoilers)

Rating: 10/10 (31 July 2004)

Innocence and Hope is what the villagers in the small utopian community put all their stock in. The goal of its founders is to engender a community of interdependence and purity in a world inundated with greed, crime, and injustice. The elders achieve their goal by injecting fear(terrorism and personal safety) into the hearts and minds of the young village citizens by inventing mysterious creatures(Al-Qaeda) and then empowering this enigma with a set of strict rules(Patriot Act) that all must abide by. This fear occupies their provincial minds so that they are unable to look past their highly-protected (governed) border and into the masked reality. This fear causes blindness and ignorance (confidential government) which over period has a byproduct of innocence. The fear is perpetuated by acts of violence (Terrorist alert levels and threats) to remind the citizens of evil which unsettles their safety and builds fear, which in turn leads to dependency on governing leaders (George WALKER Bush). Consequences and repercussions (War on Iraq) are immediate when the community regulations (safety of the innocent) are violated in order to build fear. In this case, the violators and peacekeepers are members of the same unified community; therefore, the response comes in the form of non-violent ambiguous warnings to increase their fears (Opposite the divided world we live in). The leaders in this case are also the ones who perpetuate the fear (government and media), which in turn helps to maintain the young's innocence (average citizen). The leaders are the only ones cognizant of reality (confidential government), which, in turn, leads them to be the fabricators of the masked reality (Weapons of masked destruction?) that they place over younger citizen's eyes (average citizen). The governing body channels all of the citizen's hatred at these mysterious creatures (Terrorists) causing them to unify as collective body to protect themselves (our temporary unified patriotic nation), and unknowingly their innocence and hope. In order for unanimous unification there must be only one enemy (Iraq), enemies within the unified community cannot exist.
Eventually, the village's innocence is threatened within by the inescapable human nature- jealousy, crime, and impurity manifest themselves within the village borders. Human beings proclivity to sin since the fall of man has produced every type of evil that exists. The catalyst for this evil is another inescapable human characteristic- their ability to love. Theories of dichotomy claim that in order fully know something you must also know its polar opposite. Naturally, if one claims to love they are also claiming to hate. If love exists hate exists. If hate exists, evil exists.
Evil was manifested in the form of jealousy (capitalism and democracy) that caused a violent act of injustice (suicide planes).
The audience is given the reality through horrifying stories of the elders which prompted them to create a protective innocent community. In the outside the fear has many faces and it is propagated not only by the governing but also by the media. The two pages of newspaper shown in the corrupt world contained five stories all of them dealing with crime. People are forced to live in fear because it surrounds them and this fear affects every single move they make. Therefore, the sick-cycle of fear as a protector and inhibitor continues.
Juxtaposition also occurs in the environments. The village is: self-sufficient, utopian, pure, protected, self-governing, and selfless. Whereas, the world outside its boundaries is war torn, crime infested, self-serving, and filled with greedy capitalists (Trump). The only common denominator is that they both thrive on fear. The biggest separation between the two is how they use that fear in balancing the love versus hate continuum. In the village, love drastically outweighs hate. In the world outside the village's boundaries hate overwhelms love.
The second factor that threatens the village's innocence is man's mortality. Man's mortality causes the fear that breeds all other fears, the fear of death. Man's mortality also plays a role in preserving their goals when they are no longer around. Eventually it would be time for the next generation to lead the following generations (leadership changes). In order for them to take control they must lose their innocence and fill that void with hope- a hope that what they are doing(war) is justifiable to those they protect(citizens) with their decisions and regulations.
Fear resides in every character of the film. Ivy, who is blind, is proof that fear is the result of physical being, it is an emotion created by the limits of our imagination. The character of Luscious was proclaimed as fearless, until he found purpose in his life. Prior to proclaiming is love for Ivy, Luscious felt that his purpose in life was to use his fearlessness to help others who fear. However, when love set in, Luscious' new purpose was to protect the one he loved because he feared for her death. The love he felt for his mom and the love he felt for Daniel did not cause such emotion, platonic love did. It was apparent that the roles of the elders would be passed down to Ivey and Luscious because they were had leadership qualities and they had the respect of everyone in the town. However, fear did not set in to the mind of Noah because he was mentally incapable. It takes mentally disturbed individual (Bin Laden) to violate the social contract of the world, but his insurrection was transient because it was only for personal gain. Noah fulfilled his purpose in the community; he became the severe symbol for fear. His death restored justice, helped propagate the secret of the village through fear, and supplanted the old non-violent consequences of breaking the rules with a more severe punishment.
The movie's second twist shows that while this seemed to be an event of the past (colonial America) it is in fact contemporary. (9/11; corrupted reality)
MNS strikes gold again: by twisting the audience's perception of reality, getting superb performances from his actors, while inspiring and enlightening his audience. MNS is not only the greatest director of our time, he is one of the greatest screenwriters of our time- scripts filled with powerful messages, rousing soliloquies(like Hurts in Village, Gibson's in Signs, and Jackson's in Unbreakable), humor, in a PG-13 format. Just like every other MNS film this gets a 10/10.