Village of the Damned (1960)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Village of the Damned (1960) – W. Rilla

The film starts mysteriously with all of the residents of the tiny British town of Midwich falling asleep, instantly, mid-sentence as it were.  The British military investigates and finds an invisible line encircling the village where to cross it means falling unconscious (even in a low-flying plane).  Months later, all of the women of child-bearing age fall pregnant, eventually giving birth to platinum blond children with piercing eyes. As they grow up, these children prove exceptionally intelligent and, as a group, possessed of a “hive mind”. The “son” of Professor Zellaby (George Sanders) and his wife Anthea (Barbara Shelley) is played by Martin Stephens, who subsequently used a similarly evil tone to play Miles in The Innocents (1961), an adaptation of The Turn of the Screw by Henry James. (I knew I recognised him, even with the blond wig).  This film is an adaptation of the John Wyndham novel, "The Midwich Cuckoos", drawing from the bird’s strategy of laying its eggs in the nests of other species who then raise the offspring as their own. Prof. Zellaby hopes to harness the children’s intelligence for the betterment of the world -- but alas, they are just too evil (with supernatural powers, of course). The bizarre plot is held in place by a script which has characters act realistically, responding logically and sometimes emotionally, in reaction to the strange presence in their lives and village. Suitably creepy.