The Village: A flawed but extraordinary vision. ***

Well I'm a massive fan of M.Night Shyamalan simply because of his amazing vision and his love for new and original ideas in film so I was very excited for his next film and quite frankly I was pretty impressed by it.

When I sat through the opening credits I was getting a little creeped out and this tone resonated throughout the entire movie; just this eerie feeling lurking behind every picture of the film was hanging around giving me a sick feeling to my stomach. Shyamalan is a master of suspense and a master of creating this suspense using images and camera work; he's creative in what he sees and even if his writing is a little iffy at times he makes it work. But the writing is this movies biggest crutch as its borderline perposterous but like I said he makes it work.

Well the good of this movie: the camera work. Wow, the way he uses music and images to his advantage is wonderful; this man can make ANYTHING look creepy. He uses a chair in this movie look disturbing just amazing filming and manipulation its wonderful to watch. I actually thought the story was engaging and wonderful as well; it was a new fresh breathe into the cinematic world that was very needed and people may say this plot was preposterous and out of this world but simply this actually happened back in the day and some communities still live like this with beliefs of monsters in the woods; so before you criticize do your research. I thought the story was engaging and the love triangle was unsuspected and disturbing to watch and the themes of the story were brilliant as well; using the notion of running away from sorrow is virtually impossible because sorrow is a part of our lives and its what makes us who we are.

This movie is crippled in the execution of the story; some of it is the monotonous acting of the two leads but most of it is in the writing. But the director makes it work in this movie as he directs quirky characters that we somehow connect with; I think Shyamalan gets lucky with this connection but he gets it somehow. There were times of the movie that were slow as well; as the story took a while to develop and move along I could sense a bit of antciness residing within the audience but once it took off it was okay.

The last thing I want to touch on is the strict boldness this director has with his movies; right before the scariest part of the movie he tells you that what your about to be scared of isn't real and yes he still scares you with it; this boldness shows us just how much charisma and intellect this man has behind the camera. His camerawork is so good that this notion actually gets pulled off within this film.

This is a love story and the main theme regarding this movie is the notion that love overpowers every sorrow and heartache we have in this life so we must hold dearly onto it. This is a vision that is extraordinary and I thank Mr. Shyamalan for blessing the world of movies once again for this little treat; yes it may be flawed, but its originality and creativity overcome that slight notion quite beautifully in the end. Endure the ride; its worth it.

The Matrix Revolutions: Straight Action; No Thinking Required.**

Well we completed The Matrix Trilogy the other day and after watching all three movies basically in a row I had some speculations on the third installment. Basically the Wachowski Brothers took the easy way out and gave the mass population the ending they wanted.

If it weren't for the wicked eye candy throughout the entire movie I would've hated this flick. I was very impressed with all of the amazing action, the war with the machines was gritty and intense and looked brilliant, and I loved the superman showdown between Agent Smith and Neo I was basically so happy with the movie by that point simply because it just looked so awesome. But there was something missing at the end of the movie that made me not quite satisfied.

First of all they didn't really conclude anything; they kept the Matrix around and Neo never destroyed it he just made a truce with the machines, this was unexpected and seemed like an easy way out for the direction; it seemed like they wanted to please everyone rather than doing what they really wanted and they kept the matrix around to explore the world via videogame; so they basically sold out their franchise, very uncool. Plus there wasn't any intellectual ideas explored in this movie, it just seemed like bullets were flying everywhere and plot was being run along like a rollercoaster without stopping to assess intellectual ideas like the previous two movies; the script wasn't very smart.

Well they did write a sweet climatic movie that pleased the eyes; the special effects were again top notch, but the story was lacking the punch the first two had; plus the conclusion to the franchise wasn't very concluding and left everything wide open which is okay but really I wanted to see a more bold vision come from these guys as we have seen before. But I'll take this as one sweet action flick and thats it so its not entirely a waste but in terms of a Matrix installment, it is a waste.

Thank you again for blessing the world with a fantastic Trilogy Wachowskis.