Welcome back to the GoodTrash GenreCast! This week, your favorite film analysis podcast finally discusses of one today’s most intriguing directors, M. Night Shyamalan. That’s right, we go full boar into spooky scares and twisting turns as we discuss The Village. Also, Dalton returned from the outside just in time. And, he brought friend-of-the-show Nick Sanford with him!

Wandering The Village

In the early 2000s, M. Night, as Nick points out, was THE director to watch. He had massive critical and financial success with Sixth Sense, Unbreakable and Signs. But, The Village marks a turning point. The story takes place in a remote village… Sorry. Ruled by a small council led by Edward Walker (William Hurt), the residents live as many small, rural communities would in the 19th-century. After the loss of a small child, Lucius (Joaquin Phoenix) decides to venture through the forbidden woods into the outside towns to find medicine. The council are worried about the processes of their world being thrown off by outsiders. Couple this with an imminent fear of forrest dwellers, and you’ve got the makings of a taut thriller.

We get into the the film and talk about its re-evaluation after 14 years. Our game consists of us naming our Top 3 Divisive Films. Finally, we purge The Village of its contents. Nick talks at length about the production history of the film. We look into the formalist approach Shymalan brings to the film. The question of the films politics and its engagement with the Bush Administration and 9/11 also rises to the front of our discussion. Briefly, we discuss the film’s portrayal of a certain character with intellectual disabilities.

Oh no! We’ve spotted the bad color! Time to go!

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