The Library Police
  • Home
  • The Library Police Podcast
    • Episode 250: Endings
    • Episode 249: The Lightning Round Returns
    • Episode 248: Lightning Round!
    • Episode 246: What A Difference A Decade Makes
    • Episode 245: The Portrayal of Violence in Fiction
    • Episode 244: Books to Cheer You Up
    • Episode 243: How To Read Gooder
    • Episode 242: Romance In Fiction
    • Episode 241: The Past Looms Large
    • Episode 240: How We've Grown As Readers
    • Episode 239: Saladin Ahmed's Black Bolt
    • Episode 238: A Hannibal Playlist
    • Episode 237: The Mini-Primers
    • Episode 236: Revenge of the MiniTopics
    • Episode 235: Flawed Books That We Love
    • Episode 234: Expectations and Entitlement
    • Episode 233: The Literary Canon
    • Episode 232: Playlist - The Marvel Cinematic Universe
    • Episode 231: The Perfect Nanny
    • Episode 230: SciFi V. Fantasy
    • Episode 229: Playlist - Legion
    • Episode 228: Playlist - The Americans
    • Episode 227: Should you read YA Fiction?
    • Episode 226: The Dark Tower, Books 5-7
    • Episode 224: Media for Non-Readers
    • Episode 223: Getting Into A Reading Groove
    • Episode 222: 2017 Gift Guide
    • Episode 221: The Dark Tower, Books 1-4
    • Thanksgiving Throwback: Episode 128, Featuring Christopher Merchant
    • Episode 220: The Taboo Topics
    • Episode 219: SCBWI 2017
    • Episode 218: Classics Vs. Modern
    • Episode 217: A Primer for Thrillers
    • Episode 216: The Adventure Zone Balance Arc
    • Episode 215: Young Adult Fight
    • Episode 214: What Does An Author Owe You
    • Episode 213: Adaptations
    • Episode 212: Beach Reading
    • Episode 211: Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
    • Episode 210: Interactive Storytelling
    • Episode 209: Audiobooks and Audio Storytelling
  • Features
    • A Good Story Poorly Told
    • Where Everyone Has Gone Before
    • Top Twenty Board Games of All Time
    • The Joy of Desperation
    • Prometheus: A Debate
    • Dude Writes Like A Lady
  • Reviews
    • Book Reviews
    • Film Reviews
    • Television Reviews
  • Interviews
    • Kristin O'Donnell Tubb
    • Katie McGarry
    • Gennifer Choldenko
    • Donald Bain
    • Logan L. Masterson
    • Catriona McPherson
    • Graham Brown
    • F. Paul Wilson
    • Will Lavender
    • Jeffery Deaver
    • Peter Straub
    • Dr. Bill Bass
    • Bruce DeSilva
    • D. Alan Lewis
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
  • Forums
  • Announcement

Village of the Damned

1/28/2015

0 Comments

 
Picture
A fantastically creepy horror film that works almost entirely without effects work or gore, Village of the Damned starts simply enough, with an entire village suddenly passing out in unison. It's a weirdly unsettling scene, and Village of the Damned plays it out beautifully, using silence and long camera shots to emphasize the unreality of what we're seeing. It makes the eventual awakening of the village almost a disappointment, as we fear that the rest of the movie can't quite live up to that strange opening, and to some degree, that's true. As the plot continues and the women in the town start turning up pregnant, the film in some ways goes in a more conventional fashion. And yet, that's never quite the case with Village of the Damned, which always feels slightly off and unreal, in an unsettling way. The strange children of the town are disturbing, but never terrifying; the acts they commit are menacing, and yet they remain somewhat sympathetic, in a bizarre way that's hard to place. All of that helps make the film work as well as it does, making it a horror film that's hard to pin down. Are the children the monsters they seem to be? Are they a predator, or simply a new creation defending itself? And what of that strange opening - is it an ominous omen of the danger to come, or simply a side effect of dealing with something we don't understand? Village of the Damned gets a lot of mileage out of its unease and its questions, and it makes for a gloriously strange and unsettling film that works thanks to its performances (especially George Saunders as one of the "fathers" of the town) and its low-key mood, not in spite of them. It's a great little horror gem, and one that works by being more complicated and interesting than I expected - to say nothing of being far moodier and unsettling than I expected at all.


- Josh Mauthe

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.