A Major Disappointment

an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Don't get me wrong, the original is a great classic and noting can really top that. However the Carpenter remake does take interesting steps that even the writer of the book. For example the stillborn. While much like the first movie, it's no surprise that there have been other Damned kids, whom have been swiftly eliminated. Neither side anticipated the complications that are seen in everyday child-birthing. Not only that but it's handled pretty realistically on all sides. With the mother, she wanted to have the kid in spite of the implications of the conception and the consequences the other parents faced and her denial of that pushed her over the edge. With David whom the child was to be his partner, he is the only one of the Damned that learned about pain and loss and is able to empathize with Reeve's character, who also suffered loss. This in turn caused him to at least try to reach out to the kids in hopes they could feel the same way David feels, which would give both humanity and the Damned a chance to live in peace. I can't help but praise Carpenter for trying to find a grey area, in his remake of a black and white classic.

"Village of the Damned," an adaptation of the "Midwich Cuckoos" and remake of the 1960 film of the same name, chronicles mysterious occurrences in a small Northern California town where a miles-wide blackout occurs among all the residents; inexplicably, ten women in the town find themselves pregnant, and all give birth to children on the same date nine months later. The children exhibit mysterious as they age, and seem to possess a sinister plan.One of the lesser appreciated remakes, "Village of the Damned" had something of a lackluster production history, reportedly slapped together and ushered out by Universal Pictures after being severely edited. John Carpenter, in spite of penning and directing one of the most successful independent horror films of all time ("Halloween"), has been hit-and-miss for the majority of his post-"Halloween" career, and "Village of the Damned" is considered by most to be a definite miss. Fans and critics aren't incorrect in saying so either, because the film is far from a success; the main issue it has is that it feels remarkably streamlined and atonal. An example of this is that the narrative briskly and somewhat sloppily progresses from the pre-birth of the children to their elementary school ages, yet there is no sense of time having passed. The ostensible "main" characters, a doctor and a government scientist, played by Christopher Reeve and Kirstie Alley, respectively, slip in and out of the narrative carelessly, to the point that they almost seem ancillary. Meredith Salenger plays one of the town's pregnant young women, and the only one to birth a stillborn, while Mark Hamill is the town priest—these characters also seem to fall in and out of the narrative, and the result is that the film doesn't seem to be grounded in any one character. None of the performances are remarkable, though I'd chalk this up largely to the sloppy editing and narrative arrangement.All that said, the film is beautifully shot, and is extremely atmospheric. There are fantastic compositions of the children and moody meditations of the landscape. It's overall an aesthetically interesting film. The special effects feel like overkill at times, especially with the kids' eyes—granted, it was the early nineties when the film was made, so it's permissible, though it does age the film considerably. The extravagant sci-fi effects at the end are decent and more or less effective, though the conclusion feels just as disjointed as the rest of the film.At the end of the day, I can't help but feel like much of the faults in the "Village of the Damned" are a direct result of studio intervention that left it feeling like a disjointed hodgepodge of Carpenter's original intention. While it does feel confused, it is at least entertaining and cinematographically astute. Not one of Carpenter's best by any means, though it's difficult to tell how much its defects are a result of weak foundations or Universal's meddling. 6/10.

John Carpenter seems to like putting his name with his movies as the official title of this movie is "John Carpenter's Village of the Damned." This movie is not his original though, rather it is based upon a movie made in 1960 and a book by John Wyndym, who also wrote Day of the Triffids. My friend described this movie as a "B-grade horror movie" and I am sort of inclined to agree with him except that there is a little more to it than simply nasty monsters.One Saturday afternoon, the entire village of Midwich falls asleep. The doctor (Christopher Reeve) is out of town and when he returns he finds that the FBI, state police, and army stand at the road leading in. They are all mystified as to why everybody fell asleep. Later they all wake up (and a graphic scene of a man having been cooked when he fell asleep on a barbecue is shown) and soon it is discovered that all of the women in the town are pregnant. Nine months later about nine children are born, four females and five males. One of the babies is still-born and quickly taken away by the FBI scientist (Kirsty Alley). These children grow up to become very intelligent and possessive of psionic abilities, and they begin to take control of the town.The nature of the children need be examined before the entirety of the film is looked at. These children are albino and travel in male/female pairs, all except one whose female partner died in childbirth. These children have no emotion and consider themselves to be the superior to the human race. Where they come from it not clearly explained, but that is the nature of horror movies, there is no need for explanation.The single child, David, is one of the keys to the movie. As he does not have a partner, he begins to evolve differently to the children. He begins to understand pain due to the emptiness that the absence of his partner causes. He is torn between looking for a place within the children and without. His desire to belong and his loyalty to the other children cause a conflict within. The leader of the children is a female, and this is possibly a symbol of the nature of the children. They are opposed to everything that humanity stands for. They view humanity as an enemy and thus a female, generally considered the submissive sex, rises to become the leader of the children to challenge this aspect of humanity.There are two basic fears within this movie: the fear that there exists a race that is supremely more powerful than humanity, and the parental fear that their children will rise to take their place. One of the major themes is that the children are superior to humanity. They exist to replace humanity and to destroy them. This is a basic fear as humans generally want to be the dominant. The problem is that we are not. Our fear of an extra-powerful entity is justified with the existence of God. People deal with this by making God their ally in everything they do. God is somebody, to most people, that lives with humans and demands nothing. This is not true for God demands obedience and we refuse to give it. Because we refuse to acknowledge him he will destroy us, and because of this we should respect who he is.The second fear, that of parents towards the children, is also a justified one. At one stage a parent will have many expectations of the child, but as the child grows and begins to become independent, this changes. There is generally a struggle between the child and the parent with the child wanting to go his or her own way while the parent wanting his/her will for the child. This movie manifests the ultimate fear that the child is superior to the parent and also uncontrollable. It is not the parent who controls the child but the child who controls the parent. Not only are the children in control of their parents but they also have the power of life and death over the parents, as is revealed quite quickly in the movie.I enjoyed Village of the Damned. It was not a movie that stands above other movies, but it is one in which there is some thought. The horror in this movie is more subtle than a lot of other movies, the horror being more social than spiritual.

This movie is still enjoyable to watch despite Carpenter.In fact, Carpenter had no business entitling this movie as his own since it was not his story or his screenplay in the first place. That was pure, unearned ego on his part as he tries to make his fame by latching onto the brilliant efforts of the original films & writers. Carpenter only added unnecessary, offensive gore to an already great story. The effects on the eyes were good & the extended gov't involvement with more focus on science than paranoia was also a refreshing addition as was the stillborn specimen (but that should have included more details on the lab findings than we got.) The priest character was OK until he became a suicidal gun nut which was ridiculous on too many levels to list. The boiling pot, self evisceration, barbecue, consumption by inferno & "walking tall" gun battle were just intolerable gore which added nothing to the movie.The original movie only had the children harming someone who had caused them harm or perceived as intended. This movie had them killing the innocent for no reason. That seriously degraded the story. The original contained unjustifiable gov't paranoia over acts of self-defense. By the killing of innocents such as the mothers suicides which made no sense whatsoever, it justified the paranoia to kill the children. The original idea was the children were unfairly judged because they were different & had unique abilities; acting only in self defense.I did like the survival ending on the new version. That could make an excellent sequel.It is a mistake to remake popular movies like this film, The Omen & Stepford Wives which were already great to begin with. (& never ridicule a cult classic such as was done with Stepford). Only an idiot would take plot change advice from disgruntled complainers instead of fans.It would be OK to colorize BW films and beef up the special effects & sound improvements on the originals for redistribution as was done for Star Wars & Star Trek. Sequels of great cliffhanger films would be much better ideas to pursue if done in the spirit of the original story. But it is a bad idea to redo an original classic verbatim without offering much more to the story. The desire to see more details & missing parts of the stories is what makes deleted scenes so popular with the public. They don't like to be left hanging in the dark. Hence, the need for a sequel on such movies. Not a remake of the same hanging, unanswered questions which offers nothing extra to fans.It would be better to make follow up sequels on these popular stories rather than trying to duplicate the original verbatim with a completely different cast. There's also nothing worse than an actor doing a popular film remake, who refuses to watch the original or a director who makes changes simply to imprint their ego onto it like a dog marking a hydrant.We might like to see what happens if the children survived & learn the source of their origins; as well as endings where they are successful in survival & goals as well as exceptions to their demeanor like David with multi-layered personalities.Classic films should not be used as a venue for some egomaniacal director to headline his name on the title of a movie he didn't write as Carpenter has been repeatedly guilty of doing. Perhaps he should do something original for a change rather than riding on the coat tails of someone else's ideas & efforts.Don't listen to the opinions of people who get off on gore. They are only happy with chainsaw, saw & serial hacking butcher type Jason films with no appreciation for thrilling & innovative story lines.This classic, one of a kind story has captivated audiences for over 50 years since it was first released. So even a glory stealer like Carpenter can't do too much damage to ruin it. So forget Carpenter. The actors did a good job portraying their roles despite his direction.This new version of the movie is still based on the original classic so it is still enjoyable to watch if you use the fast forward to elude the gore scenes.