| Subject: And more fun! :) |
Author:
Kiersten
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Date Posted: 13:10:54 08/03/04 Tue
In reply to:
Sara
's message, "FUN!" on 10:03:49 08/03/04 Tue
Okay, my turn! Well, love it or hate it, I'll admit that I haven't had this much discussion about a movie for a while. So kudos to Shyamalan for that, at least! :)
>but no
>matter how much time passes in a place, you may never
>get the dialect. My grandmother lived in England until
>she was 20, moved to the US and lived out the rest of
>her life here and never got rid of her accent or lost
>those british phrases we all love.
The difference I see here is that the people in the village put forth an honest effort to learn to speak that way. Your grandmother just spoke the way she did because that's the way she spoke. She probably didn't come to the US with the intent to learn to speak the same way that some Americans do. Plus, the whole point of the village was to sequester these people in a little innocent town, totally isolated from the outside world. If the children were born and raised there, why would it matter how they spoke? Who would know that they weren't using 19th century dialogue? Forget the fact that Edward Walker was a professor of American history--that's just a little excuse as to how they even figured out how to create the environment. They could have lived in a simple place and lived much the way they do without even bothering with the language, and kept the point of their village in tact. But they didn't--they chose to learn to speak differently, but they didn't learn it well despite their immersion and their efforts. I'm sure it was a stretch but still, after 20 years I'd expect a higher level of comfort than that. It didn't come across to me as a hint that this was modern, just that the actors were uncomfortable with their lines.
>The whole
>point of their village was to maintain innocence and
>Walker would not compromise the innocence of the
>village by giving in to urges.
Except he DID compromise the innocence of their village, more than once, just by perpetuating the village. It wasn't innocent at all! Crimes occured there! Noah stabbed Lucius. Mentally deficient or not, I think we can agree that's a crime. Elders were skinning animals which was against the rules. Noah was going into the woods, which also broke the rules of the village. I mean, for all we know, someone's been stealing carrots out of someone else's garden. They weren't an innocent village, and the very fact that Edward Walker will not admit that is where his whole hypocrisy thing comes in. You said, "Maintain purity and innocence at any cost." But this very thing is self-contradictory. "At any cost--" if there IS a cost, then there's a loss of purity and/or innocence. You could argue their costs are education, modern conveniences, which doesn't affect innocence. I could give you that. Except their costs are human lives. So this very choice--to have a place of innocence no matter what they have to do to maintain innocence--is a serious problem, because to keep their innocence they give up their innocence. And it's all very confusing to write about, sorry. :) Basically what I'm trying to say is that the point of the village was not accomplished by the very methods they used to try to maintain it.
>I never ever got the idea that [Noah] was an elder.
I never did either, this is just what I heard some other people saying. It didn't make sense to me. Glad to know it didn't make sense to you either, and I didn't just miss some massive clue that said he was.
>If they
>truly lived in fear of modern life, they would use all
>means necessary to protect their children, even fear.
But this is so cruel! They all lost someone to some kind of violent crime, and no doubt they were somewhat motivated by fear of more of the same to start this village. And yet here they are, motivating their children by fear--one of the very things they were trying to get away from. I understand they want to protect each other, but motivating by fear is never good. Surely there is some other way to keep themselves safe rather than terrifying the children with these awful stories and images.
>I know several
>parents who think everything their children do is
>great or ok and ignore when bad things happen and if
>the child shows signs of mental illness, than the bad
>things they do may be ignored even more.
I know what you mean and I know it is true. However, I don't think this is the case with Noah. If it was, they wouldn't even HAVE a Quiet Room for him. They'd just let him run wild doing whatever it is he wants to do. But they don't. They punish him when he does bad things.
>The kids knew they were
>there and sure it was scary but in that innocent
>environment, they weren't gonna push it.
But they already are pushing it. Just by playing chicken on the borders they're pushing it. Standing with your back to the border becomes standing two feet beyond the border, becomes standing twenty feet beyond the border, becomes spending the night beyond the border...
>We could go into a long political schpeel here
>about George W. Bush in Iraq, etc. But I don't think
>that was his point either!!
Yeah, I've heard some people making comparisons to the War on Terror, with the red and yellow colors being like the terror alert levels, and with Edward Walker being President Bush, since Walker is his middle name. I can definitely see some validity to this viewpoint, although I do not like it at all, because I do not care for extreme left or extreme right politics.
>[Noah] had
>to be punished and why not make it an accident instead
>of making them hypocritical and be cruel to him. Is
>that clear? He hurt Lucius, that was a crime. He had
>to be punished, and now that he is gone, he has given
>them an open to continue their way of life and not
>have to punish him.
And this is one of the most terrible things to me. He did have to be punished because he tried to kill Lucius. I'm with you on that one. But using his accidental death as a way to continue on their mythology and fear is awful to me. To think that none of this would have happened if they hadn't been lying and messing with people's heads in the first place, and then to use this tragic accident to perpetuate those lies makes me feel icky. It's like, "Well, we didn't want to deal with him anyway. And now we don't have to! Hooray for us!" It's an easy way out, and in my opinion, it's the cowardly way out. They could have taken the time to come to any kind of self-realization that what they were doing was not good, but they didn't. And that bugs me. A lot.
>He was just trying to write a good movie! :)
I agree. I just don't think he succeeded. ;) Sara, thanks for the good discussion we've had. And I hope you don't take any of what I say as too heated or a personal attack or anything. I know that writing on message boards can often come across that way, so I just wanted to make sure you knew that I don't mean it that way. We should see more controversial movies! :)
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