Audience Rating: Unrated
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9786301977852
Format: Black & White
ISBN: 6301977858
Label: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
Languages: Array
Manufacturer: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
Release Date: 1995-04-27
Studio: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
Theatrical Release Date: 1960-12-07

This moody little sci-fi classic has it all over the competition when it comes to possessed tykes with telekinetic powers. Midwich's mysteriously hatched brood bores into the subconscious both with their eyes and with their creepy Hitler Youth-like presence. Based on John Wyndham's 1957 novel The Midwich Cuckoos, and starring George Sanders as the most skeptical of the "miracle" parents, Village gets off to a rousing start when the isolated town of Midwich is cordoned off after some invisible knockout gas descends from above. A few weeks later, every female of childbearing age is pregnant. Much anger and consternation ensue, especially in those families for which the blessed event isn't a blessing.

Nine months later: a town full of blue-eyed, golden-haired cherubs with telekinetic and telepathic powers. The kids mature at an alarming rate and travel the streets in packs. Anyone who looks at them sideways meets with a violent accident. Barbara Shelley, Sanders's wife, is scolded by her child; a motorist who is deemed a threat winds up driving into a wall.

The film is especially refreshing in these days of computer- generated visual effects. Director Wolf Rilla, working from a script cowritten by Stirling Silliphant, generates unease the old-fashioned way: through clammy atmosphere and character development. The opening sequence, in which the military attempts to figure out the extent of the Midwich epidemic, is especially unsettling. --Glenn Lovell

Customer Rating:
Summary: Seminal British sci-fi thriller
Comment: Wolf Rilla's 1960 production of "Village of the Damned" was a cinematic jewel from a bygone era. A combination of a well conceived plot, a professional cast and creative direction was sufficient to evoke fear and terror without the use of special effects and buckets of stage blood.

Based on the novel "The Midwich Cuckoos" by John Wyndham the film depicted a strange phenomenom that befell the English countryside town of Midwich. An inexplicable and undetectable force caused every living creature within an area surrounding the town to be rendered unconscious. While only lasting a few hours this bizarre occurrence had the local military at its highest alert trying to ascertain what happened.

There weren't any major catastrophes as a result of this event just minor bumps and bruises. In a short while however it was discovered that every woman in Midwich capable of bearing a child was pregnant. The pregnancies appeared normal but the babies that were born had similar distinguishing characteristics. They were all highly intelligent, blonde haired, grew at an alarmingly rapid rate and had arresting eyes that glowed at times of intense concentration. As they matured, they all were capable of controlling the minds of the local villagers or anyone that they desired. These 12 children always travelled in groups and evoked fear from the citizens of Midwich.

George Sanders playing professor Gordon Zellaby was empowered with educating the children in a wait and see posture mandated by the government. Sander's wife Anthea played by British queen of the horror flick, the fetching Barbara Shelley had born one of the children, the apparent leader of the group, David. It soon became apparent after several inhabitants of the town who posed a threat to the children, were killed using mind control, they they had to be dealt with. Sanders took it upon himself to devise a plot to thwart the group's ambition to spread out among the society and take total control.

Having seen this film as a child, I remember that it scared the dickens out of me. After 45 years, while the film is obviously dated, it still holds up remarkably well today. Wyndham's creative mind provided a worthy framework for a well produced flick.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Village of the Damned ~ Wolf Rilla
Comment: I was lying and watching tcm one evening and this movie came on. I was skeptical since many horror movies have bad plots, no character development and terrible acting ability. This movie on the other hand had adequate ability in all three categories. This is a very messed up movie regarding the telecenetic powers of a group of blonde/blue eyed children living in England. Thier behavior is unsettling and how they act towards other is truly barbaric. It shows that there is more to being human then just intelect and that being human means showing empathy, compasion and love, something all these children lack judging from their actions. I like the fact that there is not much blood and the sparse special effects make it even more "realistic" and not silly or just plain stupid.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Superb SF classic
Comment: Don't even think about watching John Carpenter's ill-advised 1995 remake of this brilliant science fiction film. The 1960 original is subtle, tightly scripted, and superbly plotted.

In the lead role of Gordon Zellaby, George Sanders is, though a bit stuffy, mostly well cast, as is Barbara Shelley as his wife. She, and every other female of child-bearing age in the small, obscure village of Midwich, England, gives birth to a baby who grows far more quickly than is normal. In addition, these births all happen on the same day, a couple of days after a very strange blackout period lasting several hours when all residents of the village lapse into unconsciousness, and then just as suddenly pull out of it (shades of unknown viruses lurking everywhere).

This blackout period is, in my estimation, one of the very best sequences in any science fiction film of any era. It is completely strange, completely unknown as far as origin goes, and completely unexplained. The word "alien" is never used in the course of the entire film, nor is there any overt reference to visitors from other planets, although there is an indirect reference or two to this possibility, but only in one scene. The remarkable subtlety that underlies the film's tone is what makes it so resonant.

The babies demonstrate unnaturally high intelligence at a very early age and mature frighteningly quickly. All have golden blond hair and eyes that usually appear normal, but which change color when the group of children--who live and move together at all times--are disturbed enough to direct their unified powers against the one(s) who have disturbed them. This hive mentality pre-dates the Borg from Star Trek by two or three decades and is terrifically done, a tribute to both the writer (John Wyndham) of the original novel on which the film was based, and the director, Wolf Rilla.

One of the premier science fiction films of not only the 1960s, but of the 20th century, this more than deserves a DVD release. Very highly recommended.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: A "Must-Have" for Classic Sci-Fi Fans!!!
Comment: British science fiction at its absolute best. I agree with another reviewer: there should not have been a remake and I've avoided the remake because this movie is such a great classic.

As you've probably gathered from other reviews, a whole group of fast-growing blonde children with extraordinary powers are born in a British village. The children are a little skittish and a bit unforgiving when given milk (as a baby) that's too hot, or when one of the villagers nearly hits one with an automobile. It's probably not a good idea to engage them in a game of dodgeball, either. Oh well, there are always their academic pursuits, and that's what they're most interested in anyway.

The black and white gives the film that classic creepy feeling and the special effects are appropriate for the time period. I'd like to see a DVD with additional info, perhaps a trailer, and other extras produced. The mono sound works well, but I'd also ask for a psuedo-stereo expanded sound track if possible on a potential DVD.

The film may be too intense for younger children, but the filmmakers had the good taste to not include excessive gore but rather chose to leave such things to the viewer's imagination; a far more effective and discreet technique that Hollywood has thrown completely out the window, in favor of heavy-handed shock value (unfortunately). Such discretion involves the viewer *in* the film, rather than just treating the viewer as a mind-numbed spectator. See "Village of the Damned" to understand what I mean.

Buy, rent or borrow this video, you won't be disappointed if you like classic sci-fi!!!

P.S. I think this film gave the British rock group "Pink Floyd" the idea for "The Wall" album, IMHO. Those familiar with the album will see some interesting parallels.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: The Village: Terrific Acting + Gripping Camera Work
Comment: By the time the 50's came to an end, Hollywood had unleashed a legion of threats, monsters,and alien invasions on the earth. These films usually involved direct assaults on cities and terrified populations by lumbering beasts (Godzilla) or flying saucers (WAR OF THE WORLDS). Yet, political events of the mid fifties began to suggest that the next threat to humanity might be more insidious, less obvious. VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED was England's reply to the continuing question to the ending posed by THE THING (1951): "Tell the world. Watch the skies." Director Wolf Rilla took the novel by John Wyndham and rephrased it to look within at the least obvious source of danger--our own children. In Midwich, England, an entire populace faints for several hours. No reason or cause is found. The townspeople awaken and life goes on as before. But not quite. Every woman of childbearing age is inexplicably pregnant. The menfolk are understandably puzzled and not a little distrustful of their wives' chastity, while the women are depressed and fearful. All the women give birth to physically perfect children, but regardless of the parents' looks, all the babies are dark eyed blondes. As these Children grow, they show evidence of telepathy, mind control, and a hive gestalt personality. What one knows, the others know. Gordon Zellaby (George Sanders), the father of the Children's leader David (Martin Stephens), is a scientist-philosopher who tries to inculcate a sense of a humanity that he knows is missing in them, even as he denies it for years. His wife Anthea (Barbara Shelley), loves her son but is terrified and helpless when she realizes that the Children are nothing less than a threat to the continuing survival of the human species. David starkly admits to his parents that either he and his fellow Children must rule earth or humanity must kill them. One of the most significant themes of this film is the Right to Survive. Humanity, over the millenia, has obliterated any species that threatened its own survival. Now for the first time, it finds itself on the receiving end of that same threat. What the Children propose seems even more shocking since their words emerge from the lips of a golden-haired angel whose very innocuousness belies the danger of his message. Many critics of this movie have pointed out the similarities of the Children to the Hitler Jugend who resembled them in looks even if not in seeming mildness. Such an interpretation made sense since memories of the Second World War were still fresh in the audience's minds. Yet, in a startling sense of cinematic foresight, director Rilla pictures a hive mentality that is more suggestive of the Borg Collective from Star Trek: "We are the Children. You will be assimilated. Resistance is useless." The Children suggest that world conquest will be gradual with the establishment of other colonies. The Children, in effect, have thrown down the gauntlet to an embattled humanity. Fight or die. Most of humanity chooses to fight. One colony of Children is born to Eskimos, who promptly kill both mothers and children, instinctively recognizing the threat to their own survival. A second colony in Russia is similarly eradicated by a nuclear device. It is only in the third and final colony in England that the rights of the Children to survive are weighed against the right of humanity to survive. Much of THE VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED is full of such pontificating. Even when the Children bluntly tell anyone who would listen that earth cannot house two competing species, the English Powers That Be refuse to accept the solution offered by their Eskimo and Russian colleagues. The solution that Zellaby offers as a compromise--to isolate the Children--is ultimately seen as ineffective. What is needed is the Darwinian survival of the fittest: kill the threat or be killed by that threat. Such a politically incorrect message could not now emerge from any Western film center, but in the curiously innocent decades following the depredations of the real Hitler Jugend, the PI message that was truly Darwinian in scope rang clearly then. I am quite sure that the Zellaby solution of "Think of a brick wall" would have been lambasted by those who identified with the scientist from the 1951 THE THING who insisted that the plantman menace in the Arctic had the right to live, even at the cost of humanity's similar right. Zellaby, of course, proved them wrong.

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