Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Expected more

Absolutely the worst movie.

A lot more amusing than I thought it would be.

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.

This is one of my favourite movies, one of the very few horror movies that don't scare me, and I prefer the ending of this over the original movie. I have the book this is based off, and this is one of the very few movies that I can watch more than once without growing bored of it. My favourite part is that David stands out the most (in a good way) among the alien children and he's my favourite character in the movie along with how he can feel empathy and he can understand people's feelings. He has a heart and he's misunderstood, but that was only because the child he was supposed to be paired with died. It's just amazing to me how it became a mixed blessing, even though the death was bad, but it's helped him out in the way that he's portrayed as a good, but misunderstood. I don't have anything negative at all to say about this movie!

Village of the Damned is one of those films that has everything going for it but does not quite live up to its potential. It is definitely not one of John Carpenter's stronger films. The film is not bad because there are definitely many good points to it, but also quite a few not so good points. This film has a great premise. The cast was great and the effects were pretty decent. I will say the beginning and the ending are both great and suspenseful. However, the middle portion is the factor that really brings the film down.The movie stars the late Christopher Reeve as Dr. Alan Chaffee, Kirstie Alley as Dr. Susan Verner, and Mark Hamill in a small role as the village priest. The story is as follows. One day, in a small village called Midwich everyone suddenly collapses. They wake up not knowing what happened. A couple days later it is revealed that all of the village women have become pregnant at once. The babies grow at an exponential rate. They discover that the babies are of extraterrestrial origin. Even the government gets involves to uncover this mystery. The babies are born and grow very quickly in a few weeks or months. These children all have white hair, little personality, and have the ability to ready and control people's minds. Eventually they mind control people to have them commit suicide. Now it is up to Christopher Reeve to stop them.Again the film starts out great where you have the whole village suddenly losing consciousness. They, along, with the audience, are trying to figure what could have caused that. Then you have every woman in the village getting pregnant. This is all really interesting. What could have caused this, and what is their intention? Then at the end you have a fun sequence where the military comes in to deal with the children. The children then take control of all of their minds and force them to kill each other. That was a very fun scene with great production value. There are even some decent kills during the middle.However, the middle portion I found to be very boring and lackluster. Most of the middle is focused on the children, how different and inhuman they are, and the village and government debating on what to do with them. There was barely and horror, tension, action, or anything like that. I just did not care and found myself almost falling asleep. Mark Hamill's character gets killed off in a stupid way during the middle as well, which annoyed me. I am a fan of Mark Hamill, so I did not like him being killed off so early. There are some decent kills by the children here and there, but not enough for me.Also we never find out what these children really are, where they came from, and why they are doing this. We know that they hate humans, but we do not know why. All the questions that I had during the beginning of the film were never addressed. This is why I do not think this movie quite lived up to its potential.Overall, Village of the Damned is not bad, but was a bit disappointing. If you are a fan of John Carpenter and his other works then give this a look. Just do not expect something on the level of Halloween, The Thing, The Fog, etc.