The Village is a 2004 film directed by M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense (1999) and starring Joaquin Phoenix, Adrien Brody, Sigourney Weaver, William Hurt and Bryce Dallas Howard. The film tells of a 19th century village, whose inhabitants live in a constant fear of some creatures that start terrorising the village population. One of the protagonists of the film is a blind girl named Ivy. Although the movie is not as bad as critics claim and its soundtrack is absolutely beautiful, it still faults as to its plot developments and has a distracting line of stars involved. Running Out of Time is a popular 1996 book by Margaret Peterson Haddix for young adults about a girl (Jessie) in a 19th century village who is sent on a mission to town to look for medicine to cure a diphtheria epidemic in her village.

Even though the stories of The Village and Running Out of Time appear different on the first glance, there are considerable similarities between the two. The ways in which the book and the film are similar speak volumes when one considers the most important things of both: Running Out of Time’s narrative and The Village’s final plot twist.

**SPOILER ALERT**

Similarities:

People live in a “make-believe” 19th century rural village when outside it is, in fact, the 20th century: In both The Village and Running Out of Time, people initially agreed to a kind of a “social experiment” to live in a 19th century rural setting, while, outside of their village setting, it is, in fact, the 20th century.

The peculiarities of the village:

– Both villages in the book and in the film are constructed as “natural reserves”, whereby it is the 19th century setting on the inside and the usual modern life going on outside of the reserve. 

– Both villages have special rules/”scare-tales” forbidding the villagers from leaving the compounds. In the film, it is “those we do not speak of”, some monsters, which could strike at random. In the book, it is the “haunted trees” that scare children and, thus, they are afraid to trespass the boundaries. Neither of these things turn out to be true, as “haunted trees” in the book are just cameras/other modern equipment installed to spy on the village population, and the so-called “those we do not speak of” are just costumes some villagers wear to scary other population and not have them wandering off too far.

– In both Running Out of Time and in The Village, the guards of the compounds are patrolling the perimeters of the boundaries constantly (making sure that the borders are secure), and there are cameras installed across the perimeter. The villagers also have “special (do-not-disturb) arrangements” with the outside world. 

– In the book and in the film, the village people are presented as possessing little “modern” knowledge, they are “backward-looking”, religious people who have an aversion of a town. A town is seen in their eyes as where “wicked people” live.

A vulnerable girl is sent out to seek vital medicine and bring it back home to cure her loved one(s) who became sick: Jessie in Running Out of Time and Ivy in The Village are sent out by their mother/father outside the compounds of the village because people/person who is the dearest to a girl suffers badly and need(s) medical attention – some medicine which can be found only outside the boundaries of the village. In that vein, Jessie is sent out to seek medical help to save her school friends from diphtheria, and Ivy makes her journey to find medicine to help her fiancée who is badly injured due to a knife stabbing.

Interestingly, in both the film and book, the name of the medicine needed is written on a piece of paper, and both Jessie and Ivy carry this note to show to people so they know what medicine is needed (Jessie is too young to understand/differentiate the medicine and Ivy is blind and incapable of doing so).

The peculiarities of the girl:

– Both Ivy (The Village) and Jessie (Running Out of Time) are “vulnerable” and are initially afraid to venture outside their village boundaries. Jessie is vulnerable because she is still a child, being only 13, and is sent out from her home all alone to a mysterious town for medical supplies. Ivy is vulnerable because she is blind and may not find her way out/in or fall victim to some creature/monster.

– Both Ivy and Jessie do not initially know that it is actually 20^th century outside of their village compound and are shocked to discover the truth. Both girls are told of the “secret” and are sent out on a mission by their closest relatives. It is Ivy’s father who finally reveals to Ivy what is going on beyond the village’s borders, giving his blessing for Ivy to go on a journey. Similarly, it is Jessie’s mother who equips Jessie for her dangerous journey ahead, and finally revels to her that, in fact, it is the 20th century outside of their village.

– Both Ivy and Jessie associate themselves with boys and their boyish behaviour. Ivy in The Village is surrounded by her two male friends, and is praised for “running like a boy”. Similarly, Jessie in Running Out of Time is described as a tomboy.

The girl receives external help from an unknown male to fetch the medicine: in both the book and the film, Ivy/Jessie receives help from a male stranger to bring the medicine home/cure their beloved. Ivy is believed by a lone ranger who patrols the borders of her compound, and Jessie is helped by a cameraman/journalist. Both presumably save people/person they love as a result.

In both the movie and book, there is actually a child death documented, and one person volunteers to go outside of the village boundaries to fetch the necessary medicine unavailable in the village. In the beginning of The Village, there is a scene where the funeral of a young child is depicted, and there is actually a scene in the movie where the character of Joaquin Phoenix volunteers to go to town to fetch the necessary medicine for the community. In Running Out of Time, the sole purpose of Jessie’s journey to town was to find medicine to prevent the dying of children from the contagious disease.

There may not be many similarities, but because the above similarities play such an important role both in the film and in the book, it is not their number, but their quality/substance, which is important. On that basis, the claim of plagiarism becomes substantial. Even though the publishers of Running Out of Time considered pursuing a plagiarism action in court against M. Night Shyamalan, as far as I know, such action is yet to materialise.