I've just watched the movie for the first time and I have a confession.
I knew there were a lot of people who didn't like this film. I knew there was going to be a twist at the end.
What I didn't know that I would spoil the film for myself.
I had completely forgotten about the supposed year of 1897 shown at the start, so while I was watching the rest of the film I tried to work out the twist based on how the village related to the present-day. My very first suspicion was that the village was some sort of sociological experiment that kept a community living as if was the 18th or 19th century. I wasn't too far off. The revelation that it was 2004 failed to shock me (I thought it was the present-day all along not because I actually worked it out but because I had no reason to believe otherwise).
When I found out about the tombstone's date all I could think was, "What was the need for giving us that information?" It would have made no difference if we didn't know it was 1897 and it slightly devalued the film. It was a bare-faced lie to fool us. But because fate allowed me to ignore the lie, I am not angry. It shows our friend Shymalan made a huge error. What if there are others who have perhaps missed the opening minute? As an experiment, show this film to someone (with some degree of intelligence) who hasn't watched it before, but from after the funeral scene. I bet they won't find the it's-2004-twist surprising.
For me this film was about innocence lost and going to great lengths to regain it. It was an extreme thing to do, but understandable. Adrien Brody's character harboured the two sides of every human in their extremes - the completely innocent and the insanely violent.
The connotations become more and more obvious as you think about the film, which in the end is a very entertaining commentary on the modern-day world.
Despite everything, a very good movie.
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