The following review was released in the July edition (Volume 11, #4) of the Creative Screenwriting magazine (available at your local Borders) The review is based on a 2003 production draft of the script's original title, The Woods.
(WARNING: SPOILERS!)
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"Its sad to report that The Village script, as written, marks a new low point in M. Night Shyamalans screenwriting career. Sad only because everyone knows he has great talent, but somehow seems not to have brought it to this draft. While many of its blemishes will be cleaned up by the films release, even a thorough scrubbing couldnt possibly wash way all of the deep-rooted story problems here. The Village script fails because it features poorly realized characters, dialogue, and story. This is the sixth script that Shyamalan has written and directed, and it seems hes fallen too much in love with his own material to put the hard work necessary into elevating it- common ditch that most auteurs eventually fall into, and only a few ever managed to escape.
The Village begins in the year 1896 with the death of a child that we later learn might have been saved if proper medicine had been available. But the villagers arent allowed to enter the nearby forbidden Covington Woods and head into town for feat of attack from mysterious creatures known only has Those we dont speak of. This Amish-like society fears cities and considers them equally as dangerous as the beasts that lurk the woods. Eventually the protagonist, Lucius, suffers a near-fatal injury and his blind fiancée, Ivy, makes the dangerous journey into the woods so that she can procure medicine from the nearest city to save him.
Yes folks, you guessed it- theres a twist at the end. Shyamalan seems incapable of writing anything that doesnt include an outrageous final twist, and The Village produces his weakest ending to date. The Sixth Sense ending wowed audiences worldwide because very few of them had ever seen Jacobs Ladder or The Twilight Zone episode An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge (also Best Short Subject Academy Award winner in 1964). Even though the concept had been popularized in those previous films, Shyamalans moody script and steady direction made his film successful and deserves credit.
But hes become a victim of his own success and now employs twists for twists sake at the end of all his films. In Unbreakable we learn that Bruce Willis and Samuel Jackson are respectively real-world superheroes and super-villains. Many people rejected that twist, as absurd as it was, it had more honesty than Shyamalans subsequent turns. In Signs the twist relied on a Highway to Heaven-styled schmaltzy message from beyond the grave as Mel Gibsons remembrance of his dying wifes final words helped his family defeat the aliens invading their house. Forget the fact that these aqua-fearing aliens invaded a planet covered with 90% water- one special family learned how to believe in God while battling aliens!
With The Village Shyamalan tries to pitch his best twister at you, but you can see it coming if youve been paying attention. And youd have to be paying attention because Shyamalan forgot to mask his twist under any sort of compelling narrative or characters. Think about it- a backwards society thats cut off from the rest of the worlds that repeatedly mentions their hatred of modern cities and clings to beliefs of simpler times-one that forbids its youth from exiting the villages borders for fear of an attack by forest bests. It practically telegraphs the ending series of twists. For the first fifty pages these beasts are never seen and only spoken about. Then on page fifty a sentry triggers an alarm, and we see nothing but shadows and folks hiding and crying. This repeats a few times until the beasts mysteriously skin all the villagers animals and hang them around town. Youd hope its leading to confrontation, but the changes of that are bleak.
Then Shyamalan makes the biggest blunder a writer can make in handling suspense: he tells you the answer to one of the scripts mysteries. Tells, not shows. The first twist occurs on page 96 (out of 125) when the blind Ivy is told by an elder that there are no real beasts, and that its all been a part of an elaborate scheme by the elders to keep their happy community cut off from the rest of the world. This was done in order to preserve their innocent way of life. The guilt-ridden Edward tells Ivy so she can save her true love. By telling, rather than showing, Shyamalan takes away any sense of discovery and drama that the audience might have enjoyed after being led down a dead end for 90 minutes. While The Sixth Sense ultimately contained real ghosts, and Signs had aliens, its a letdown to learn there are no real bests here. Still, its expected because the script does such a good job of hiding them that by page 96 theyre too boring and unbelievable to really exist anyway.
When the final question is raised about how none of the elders skinned the villagers animals and maybe there are actually beasts, its clear that the script doesnt bother with that subplot. After sending a blind girl into the woods to find a nearby town for medicine, the script lowers itself again by having its secondary beast turn out to be the mentally retarded character Noah, who childishly longs for Ivys unrequited love. Hes apparently found the elders beast costumes and runs around causing his own ruckus trying to scare Ivy.
Ivy should know its Noah because she claimed to be able to see peoples auras earlier in the script, but now suddenly Noahs bad costume hides his aura? Its inconsistent. But even after outwitting Noah, Shyamalans game of Twister hasnt ended yet. As Ivy blindly stumbles around, were left with plenty of time to think about where shes going, and all evidence suggests that this cultish, backward society probably isnt stuck in 1896, leaving little surprise when Ivy stumbles onto a highway in 2004. Its just another bad twist for twists sake, seemingly an apologetic one, because maybe Shyamalan (subconsciously) knows how weak the previous two twists were.
Shyamalan constantly attempts a Hitchcock style but has sadly forgotten the most classic Hichtcockian lessons: dont telegraph your twist, cover it up with a Macguffin- the plot device used to distract your audience from the hidden truth. In this script the Macguffin is the mysterious group of beasts. Theyre what should focus attention so completely that we could never imagine a Truman Show-type reveal. But Shyamalan did such a lazy job of only suggesting the beasts that theres plenty of time to let ones mind wander through various monologues and the clunky old speak employed throughout. If The Village had any sort of action, adventure, discovery, horror or real romance rather than restrained romance maybe we might have been invested enough in the story to attain a feeling similar to the end of the original Planet of the Apes when Heston realizes hes been on Earth the whole time. But since Shyamalan forgot to construct a real story behind his twists, that entire house of cards has already fallen long before they occur. The Hitch-cockian protagonist switch, a la Psych, from Lucius to Ivy kind of works, but both characters read so blandly that it ultimately doesnt matter. The silliest reveal comes in the final pages when one of the elders locked wooden boxes is opened to reveal a pair of blue jeans. The boxes werent too important in this draft, but hopefully something better than blue jeans will emerge from them by the final film.
Is this the end of M. Night Shyamalan? Of course not. His past successes will continue to provide future opportunities. Shyamalan is still a talented writer who has written a very readable script, but one incapable of ever getting produced unless someone of his stature fell in love with it. But who could fall in love with a faux horror script that lacks the honestly-earned scares? This draft was devoid of a strong protagonist, strong secondary characters, or compelling character motivations. Narrative experimentation is always encouraged, but never fruitful, when the writing behind it remains lazy. Hopefully Shyamalan has done an inspired rewrite and all the scripts flaws have been erased. But as for this particular draft, if it were a spec from an unknown writer, it wouldnt sell, because the writer has forgotten how to entertain and has become transfixed with finding the next chic twist."
It's possible that writing changes have been made to the film since then. We will see in 5 days.
(WARNING: SPOILERS!)
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.........
........
.......
......
.....
....
...
..
.
..
...
....
.....
......
.......
........
.........
..........
...........
"Its sad to report that The Village script, as written, marks a new low point in M. Night Shyamalans screenwriting career. Sad only because everyone knows he has great talent, but somehow seems not to have brought it to this draft. While many of its blemishes will be cleaned up by the films release, even a thorough scrubbing couldnt possibly wash way all of the deep-rooted story problems here. The Village script fails because it features poorly realized characters, dialogue, and story. This is the sixth script that Shyamalan has written and directed, and it seems hes fallen too much in love with his own material to put the hard work necessary into elevating it- common ditch that most auteurs eventually fall into, and only a few ever managed to escape.
The Village begins in the year 1896 with the death of a child that we later learn might have been saved if proper medicine had been available. But the villagers arent allowed to enter the nearby forbidden Covington Woods and head into town for feat of attack from mysterious creatures known only has Those we dont speak of. This Amish-like society fears cities and considers them equally as dangerous as the beasts that lurk the woods. Eventually the protagonist, Lucius, suffers a near-fatal injury and his blind fiancée, Ivy, makes the dangerous journey into the woods so that she can procure medicine from the nearest city to save him.
Yes folks, you guessed it- theres a twist at the end. Shyamalan seems incapable of writing anything that doesnt include an outrageous final twist, and The Village produces his weakest ending to date. The Sixth Sense ending wowed audiences worldwide because very few of them had ever seen Jacobs Ladder or The Twilight Zone episode An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge (also Best Short Subject Academy Award winner in 1964). Even though the concept had been popularized in those previous films, Shyamalans moody script and steady direction made his film successful and deserves credit.
But hes become a victim of his own success and now employs twists for twists sake at the end of all his films. In Unbreakable we learn that Bruce Willis and Samuel Jackson are respectively real-world superheroes and super-villains. Many people rejected that twist, as absurd as it was, it had more honesty than Shyamalans subsequent turns. In Signs the twist relied on a Highway to Heaven-styled schmaltzy message from beyond the grave as Mel Gibsons remembrance of his dying wifes final words helped his family defeat the aliens invading their house. Forget the fact that these aqua-fearing aliens invaded a planet covered with 90% water- one special family learned how to believe in God while battling aliens!
With The Village Shyamalan tries to pitch his best twister at you, but you can see it coming if youve been paying attention. And youd have to be paying attention because Shyamalan forgot to mask his twist under any sort of compelling narrative or characters. Think about it- a backwards society thats cut off from the rest of the worlds that repeatedly mentions their hatred of modern cities and clings to beliefs of simpler times-one that forbids its youth from exiting the villages borders for fear of an attack by forest bests. It practically telegraphs the ending series of twists. For the first fifty pages these beasts are never seen and only spoken about. Then on page fifty a sentry triggers an alarm, and we see nothing but shadows and folks hiding and crying. This repeats a few times until the beasts mysteriously skin all the villagers animals and hang them around town. Youd hope its leading to confrontation, but the changes of that are bleak.
Then Shyamalan makes the biggest blunder a writer can make in handling suspense: he tells you the answer to one of the scripts mysteries. Tells, not shows. The first twist occurs on page 96 (out of 125) when the blind Ivy is told by an elder that there are no real beasts, and that its all been a part of an elaborate scheme by the elders to keep their happy community cut off from the rest of the world. This was done in order to preserve their innocent way of life. The guilt-ridden Edward tells Ivy so she can save her true love. By telling, rather than showing, Shyamalan takes away any sense of discovery and drama that the audience might have enjoyed after being led down a dead end for 90 minutes. While The Sixth Sense ultimately contained real ghosts, and Signs had aliens, its a letdown to learn there are no real bests here. Still, its expected because the script does such a good job of hiding them that by page 96 theyre too boring and unbelievable to really exist anyway.
When the final question is raised about how none of the elders skinned the villagers animals and maybe there are actually beasts, its clear that the script doesnt bother with that subplot. After sending a blind girl into the woods to find a nearby town for medicine, the script lowers itself again by having its secondary beast turn out to be the mentally retarded character Noah, who childishly longs for Ivys unrequited love. Hes apparently found the elders beast costumes and runs around causing his own ruckus trying to scare Ivy.
Ivy should know its Noah because she claimed to be able to see peoples auras earlier in the script, but now suddenly Noahs bad costume hides his aura? Its inconsistent. But even after outwitting Noah, Shyamalans game of Twister hasnt ended yet. As Ivy blindly stumbles around, were left with plenty of time to think about where shes going, and all evidence suggests that this cultish, backward society probably isnt stuck in 1896, leaving little surprise when Ivy stumbles onto a highway in 2004. Its just another bad twist for twists sake, seemingly an apologetic one, because maybe Shyamalan (subconsciously) knows how weak the previous two twists were.
Shyamalan constantly attempts a Hitchcock style but has sadly forgotten the most classic Hichtcockian lessons: dont telegraph your twist, cover it up with a Macguffin- the plot device used to distract your audience from the hidden truth. In this script the Macguffin is the mysterious group of beasts. Theyre what should focus attention so completely that we could never imagine a Truman Show-type reveal. But Shyamalan did such a lazy job of only suggesting the beasts that theres plenty of time to let ones mind wander through various monologues and the clunky old speak employed throughout. If The Village had any sort of action, adventure, discovery, horror or real romance rather than restrained romance maybe we might have been invested enough in the story to attain a feeling similar to the end of the original Planet of the Apes when Heston realizes hes been on Earth the whole time. But since Shyamalan forgot to construct a real story behind his twists, that entire house of cards has already fallen long before they occur. The Hitch-cockian protagonist switch, a la Psych, from Lucius to Ivy kind of works, but both characters read so blandly that it ultimately doesnt matter. The silliest reveal comes in the final pages when one of the elders locked wooden boxes is opened to reveal a pair of blue jeans. The boxes werent too important in this draft, but hopefully something better than blue jeans will emerge from them by the final film.
Is this the end of M. Night Shyamalan? Of course not. His past successes will continue to provide future opportunities. Shyamalan is still a talented writer who has written a very readable script, but one incapable of ever getting produced unless someone of his stature fell in love with it. But who could fall in love with a faux horror script that lacks the honestly-earned scares? This draft was devoid of a strong protagonist, strong secondary characters, or compelling character motivations. Narrative experimentation is always encouraged, but never fruitful, when the writing behind it remains lazy. Hopefully Shyamalan has done an inspired rewrite and all the scripts flaws have been erased. But as for this particular draft, if it were a spec from an unknown writer, it wouldnt sell, because the writer has forgotten how to entertain and has become transfixed with finding the next chic twist."
It's possible that writing changes have been made to the film since then. We will see in 5 days.