- Why did the characters all talk in whispers?
- Why would an episcopalian, I assume, priest
be living in a remote farmhouse? - Why would an episcopalian priest have a corn field and if he did, why wasn’t this explained in the movie?
- Why did everyone stop wearing those chocolate kiss drop - shaped aluminum foil hats after awhile , long before the danger from having their minds read was over?
- It said that three towns in the mideast had figured out how to get rid of the space aliens, but I don’t think this method was actually given! Or are we to assume they threw water on them?
- The priest said that God gave his son asthma so he couldn’t breathe in the poison gas that the alien was trying to breathe on him, but why didn’t God just keep the aliens from bothering people altogether?
- What did that brother do for a living?
I think you’re putting too much tought into a terrible movie
Because M. Night Shamalamalayamayalayamam is a bad director and doesn’t know of any other way to get his characters to express fear. For lots more whispering watch The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable.
Why not?
The movie was pretty clear about the fact that he Lost His Faith after his wife was killed. Perhaps he decided to become a farmer as a career change.
The tinfoil hats were a comedic device. The characters were smart enough to realize that they were stupid.
That’s what I assumed.
Because then Our Hero wouldn’t ever find out that God gave his son asthma to protect him from the aliens and would never get his faith back!
I think he was an assistant-farmer-dude.
It is culturally insensitive for you to demean him by mangling his name, which is, of course, M. Night Shamalamadingdong.
Sorry.
He worked in a gas station. Someone asks him how it’s going down at the gas station(I believe the lady cop).
Oh yeah. He did live on the farm in what appeared to be a guest-house type of thing, though.
1) Why did the characters all talk in whispers?
Dramatic tension.
2) Why would an episcopalian, I assume, priest
be living in a remote farmhouse?
He lost his faith after his wife died, since he couldn’t figure out why God would let her be killed (and in the horrible way she died, cut in half and still alive for a while). He became a farmer afterwards, but people still call him “father.”
3) Why would an episcopalian priest have a corn field and if he did, why wasn’t this explained in the movie?
Because he’s a farmer. It was.
4) Why did everyone stop wearing those chocolate kiss drop - shaped aluminum foil hats after awhile , long before the danger from having their minds read was over?
There never was any danger from their minds being read. The kids were impressionable, and read the book that said they should wear them, so they did. The brother probably wore his because the kids asked him to.
5) It said that three towns in the mideast had figured out how to get rid of the space aliens, but I don’t think this method was actually given! Or are we to assume they threw water on them?
Yes, we are to assume that. That’s why it’s ironic that they didn’t go to the lakes when they had the opportunity. I believe the scene where we’re told they figured out a method has a line like “…we will report what this method is when we are told,” or something like that. There seems to be no other way to kill them.
6) The priest said that God gave his son asthma so he couldn’t breathe in the poison gas that the alien was trying to breathe on him, but why didn’t God just keep the aliens from bothering people altogether?
That’s one of the puzzles you’re supposed to figure out.
**7) What did that brother do for a living? **
He was in the minor leagues and swung the bat every time, remember? Because he did that he had to leave and now works in a gas station.
My questions about the OP questions:
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I thought it was three towns in the Middle East, meaning Asia Minor, which seemed strange, since water is scarce in much of that region. Wouldn’t the aliens have avoided extremely rainy or humid areas, like the Pacific Northwest or the tropics (Brazil, for example), or regions with significant snowfall? And wouldn’t that pattern have been noticed? Or was that part of the hoaky spiritual significance of the various coincidences and odd behavior that made up the movie? The aliens may have been vulnerable to water, but they didn’t seem to fond of being smacked with bats and having their fingers cut off.
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Wouldn’t some of the poison gas still be in the son’s nasal passages and mouth once his lungs opened up again?
Other questions about the movie:
How could aliens that seem to have practical interstellar travel be dependent upon communications that seemed to use the same frequencies as a common baby monitor? In addition to the goofy navigating by crop circles mess.
If you are an invading alien race, vulnerable to water, harvesting food from human beings (who are mostly water, BTW) on Earth which is mostly covered by water, why wouldn’t you use some kind of environmental suits for protection even if you don’t wear clothing?
Or should I just refer all questions to skateboarder87’s post since I agree with the assessment of the movie?
Some of you seem to be implying that Mel and family moved to the farm after the wife was killed, but that can’t be right. In the confrontation between little boy Culkin and Mel about moving to the lake, little boy Culkin says that he doesn’t want to leave because this is where they lived with their mom. In addition, there are signs near the beginning of the movie that he was a minister while he lived in that house – for instance, the outline of a cross where there was a wallhanging.
My answer is that it doesn’t matter where the minister lives as long as it within reasonable driving distance of the church. Perhaps it was the wife’s family’s farm. Perhaps it had been handed down in Mel’s family. I don’t think there’s enough information in the film to answer that question.
And for the record, I enjoyed the movie. Great cinema? No. But an hour and a half of nice tension and a good dose of humor.
I thought the movie was fun. I have a close friend who is an Episcopalian priest. I told her the characterization of the priest was just as deep as the characterization of the Big Scary Alien Guy. All the Big Scary Alien Guy did was wear a deep green rubber suit, hiss, and weave back and forth in a menacing manner.
I’m allergic to strawberries.
Maybe I should invade a planet covered in strawberries with lots of strawbery vapors in the air and attack lifeforms composed of 70% strawberries. Makes sense to me.