Subj : Village of the Damned
To   : DUMAS WALKER
From : SHURATO
Date : Sun Feb 25 2024 22:25:06

 DW> The other day I had the opportunity to watch Village of the 
Damned, and
 DW> the sequel Children of the Damned, for the first time.

 DW> Both were very interesting.  I prefered the original to the 
sequel.  The
 DW> original premise is that there is some "peculiar event" that puts 
the
 DW> inhabitants of a particular area into a state of syspended 
animation where
 DW> they all appear dead.  Anyone who enters the area after the 
initial event
 DW> is also affected.

 DW> Once everyone comes to, they realize that time continued to move 
on
 DW> without them. They also realize that many of the fertile women of 
the
 DW> village have become pregnant, and that this single English village
 DW> is not the only village in the world where a similar event 
happened
 DW> at the same time.

 DW> The children grow quickly and appear to be mentally gifted well 
beyond
 DW> their years.  They also start showing signs of additional powers 
that they
 DW> use maliciously, threatening their fellow villagers.

 DW> I won't give up how it ends, but it is a good sci-fi/suspense 
flick.

 DW> The sequel starts off with individual children in different 
countries who,
 DW> like the kids in the original movie, are gifted beyond their 
years.  The
 DW> UN gets involved and initially tries to unite the children. 
However,
 DW> like in the original movie, they too are soon identified as being
 DW> a potential threat that must be dealt with.

 DW> The sequel was also suspenseful, but I didn't think it was as good 
as the
 DW> first.  Although it was sci-fi, it seemed to spend more effort on 
the
 DW> message... that humans don't react well when exposed to people who 
are
 DW> different.

 DW> I also could not get over the fact that, although this is a sequel 
and
 DW> although the events took place after the events in the first, that 
no one
 DW> in the second seemed to be familar with said events in the first.  
They
 DW> did try to keep it hush-hush from the general public in the first
 DW> movie, but the military in at least two of the involved countries,
 DW> and at least some in the science community, were certainly aware.

 DW> Waiting for someone to speak up and say "hey, remember when..." 
and then
 DW> using that knowledge to apply to the current situation may have 
kept me
 DW> from enjoying the sequel as much.

I haven't seen the sequel, but the first one had an epic psychic battle
between Christopher Reeves and the kids!  No spoilers!

SEEN-BY: 1/107 17/1

.