Grade: B-

Verdict: A lot less than "The Sixth Sense," but a lot more than "Unbreakable."

By BOB LONGINO
Cox News Service

Among the surprises in M. Night Shyamalan's "The Village," an eerie enough movie with at least one great shocker, is the emergence of Ron Howard's daughter, Bryce Dallas Howard, as a certifiable star.

She plays Ivy Walker, the blind girl in this tale of a tiny Pennsylvania community surrounded by woods and choked by a legend that monstrous creatures are out there in the dark. They'll get you if you don't watch out.

Circumstances eventually thrust Bryce Dallas Howard to the fore. She stands and delivers as well as anyone in the film. Those are strong words because her co-stars include Oscar nominees Joaquin Phoenix and Sigourney Weaver and Oscar winners William Hurt and Adrien Brody.

The film's worthiest jolt isn't even at the end -- that place where all Shyamalan movies twist and turn inside out in an attempt to flabbergast. No, this movie's real jawdropper occurs about halfway through and involves Phoenix, who plays the protagonist Lucius Hunt, and Brody, the village's lovable, mentally imbalanced Noah Percy. The scene is perfectly acted, perfectly filmed. To say any more than that would spoil one of the best film moments so far this year.

Sadly, the entire movie doesn't match that one dynamite scene. Overall, "The Village" is too caught up in its surprise ending. This twist is Shyamalan's most complicated to date. It's built on layer upon layer of ambiguity and absurdity and, ultimately, it masks much of an interesting morality play that works without all the weird revelations.

In other words, "The Village" pales next to the crackerjack ghost story of "The Sixth Sense" but excels far beyond the psychobabbling in "Unbreakable." Many may find it on par with the alien-obsessed "Signs."

Together, those first three films earned $1.329 billion worldwide. There's every reason to believe "The Village" will add a lot more to Shyamalan's kitty.

In this new film, audiences are pretty much on their own to figure out the lay of the land. The villagers' wood and stone homes are illuminated by candlelight. They wear late 18th-century clothing and speak with an untimely vernacular. "I am but scared for my only son's life," says Weaver, who plays Phoenix's mother.

Yellow is a safe color. Red is ... uh ... not. It attracts "those we do not speak of," as one character says.

Villagers wear yellow (naturally), hooded wool ponchos. We learn the creatures' ponchos are red (naturally). And, my, what big eyes they have. The better to see villagers with, my dear.

Shyamalan builds dread by what you don't know.

Faraway towns are described as "wicked places where wicked people live." There's "the old shed that is not to be used." Some houses contain mysterious -- and locked -- black boxes. Before an important revelation, the town's leader, played by Hurt, warns his daughter, "Do your very best not to scream."

Shyamalan films roughly half the movie with primarily wide-angle, faraway views and half with in-your-face closeups. Early on, it's sometimes unsettling to see actors share scenes so faraway from the camera, but when the director decides to go close up, the contrast ultimately heightens the tension.

Though it's steeped in plot twists, "The Village" is, at its core, a love story between Howard's Ivy and Phoenix's Lucius. In Shyamalan's script, that love is the ultimate in innocence, steadfastly moral and overwhelming.