The Watchers
June 13, 2024 by admin_name
The Watchers
released 2024
www.ink2quill.com
“The Watchers/ The Watched” is a UK and Irish Scifi, supernatural horror, suspense film written and directed by Ishana Night Shyamalan, the daughter of the great M. Night Shyamalan. It is based on a novel of the same name written by A. M. Shine. It was produced by Stephen Dembitzer, Shuni Chopra Dhar, Ed Guiney, Jo Homewood, Nimitt Mankad, Ashwin Rajan, Jeff Robinson, Grace winters, Delia Khong, Andrew Low and M. Night Shyamalan. It stars Dakota Fanning, Georgina Campbell, Olwen Fouere, Oliver Finnegan, Alistair Brammer, John Lynch, Siobhan Hewlett, Hannah Dargan, Emily Dargan, Joel Figueroa, Thabile Michelle Hlongwane, Anthony Morris, Shane O’Regan, Jim Tighe, Morgan Bailey-Rocks, Zarima McDermott, Christian Bailey-Rocks, Eabha Connolly, Hannah Howland, Kya Brame, Ffion Haf, Shannon Antonia, Kofi De Graft Jordan, Charles Camrose, Charlie Mann, Jacob Greenway, Andrea Bechis, Cara Steele, Sean T. O Meallaigh. This film was a huge success among supernatural and horror film fans.
“The Watchers/ The Watched” is the supernatural story of American immigrant Mina, played by Dakota Fanning. She is living in Galway and working at a pet shop when an errand asked of her by her boss turns into a journey into the horrific and supernatural. Mina is somebody with clear issues. She has to come to terms with the death of her mother and her role in the car crash on that day. Mina leads a miserable life of loneliness, promiscuity and crushing guilt. She doesn’t have many friendships and avoids her family and other connections with people. Everything about her screams self neglect and self loathing.
Everything changes for her when she is asked to drive an expensive bird through the countryside over to a buyer. The errand starts as a beautiful ride through the countryside. She plays her music and seems to enjoy the ride until she runs her car off the road and when she goes for help she soon realizes that she is lost. The distance and place of things in these woods seem to change. Distances and her perceptions become skewed. And to top it all off the sun is going down and there are strange beasts in the woods. A mysterious woman named Madeline, played by Olwen Fouere, appears and saves Mina from the beasts by bringing her to a cabin in the woods with a metal door and a wall of thick, see-through glass. From then on the story descends into the strange and horrific. But it is a great tale.
The symbolism in this film are so well done and there are clear inspirations in the story from the Hollywood giants in film. The very beginning of the story, when Mina is taking a bird to a buyer, has the flavor of the Hitchcock masterpiece “The Birds”. As a matter of fact, in this story, birds are very symbolic. In my opinion, they represent the way through the supernatural nightmare that is the woods and the inner demons in Mina. Mina is led into the woods because of a bird, the murder of crows flying overhead when she arrives in the woods are a good foreshadowing of things to come, and at the very end the little bird, Darwin, in the cage is right there with her.
So, many good horror or even supernatural stories are based on the idea that a protagonist has unresolved issues or things inside themselves that they refuse to acknowledge that manifest themselves in reality. Movies like “Babadook” and so many others are good examples of this. We can say that the story of the faeries in the woods has similarities to the inner turmoil raging inside Mina. Not to give away any spoilers, ask yourself what do Madeline and Mina have in common besides being friends at the end? Well, they both have dealt with feelings of being unwanted in their backgrounds and must find a way to reconnect with the present and not stay locked in the past. The wonderful theme in this film is one of moving forward in your life and not staying stuck in the past. I loved the line Mina says “I don’t belong here!” That sums up her drive to leave her bad situation and move forward in her life. Mina is a person who is growing and that is a beautiful thing to see in a person or hero of a film. She’s a great protagonist. Ishana Night Shyamalan wrote great protagonists in Mina and Madeline. Well done.
This is a great watch and I highly recommend it.
John Ink2Quill
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