Village of the Damned

In a small English village, the residents suddenly lose consciousness for several hours. After they wake, the lives of the community resume as before, until a number of women of childbearing age discover that they are pregnant. Government officials take an interest in the pregnancies, and when the children are born they share striking features: pale blond hair and unusual eyes. The children also possess remarkable intelligence and a powerful bond with one another, and as they grow, their behaviour becomes a source of fear for the villagers. George Sanders plays Gordon Zellaby, a local scientist whose wife, Anthea, is among the mothers, with Martin Stephens as their son David. Barbara Shelley, Michael Gwynn, Laurence Naismith and Richard Warner appear in supporting roles.

Directed by Wolf Rilla, the film was written by Stirling Silliphant, Rilla and producer Ronald Kinnoch, and was made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's British studios. It followed Rilla's 1953 film Roadhouse Girl and was released in June 1960, running just over an hour and a quarter. Its worldwide box office reached about one million dollars.

On IMDb the film holds a rating of 7.3 from roughly twenty-one thousand votes, and on TMDB it has a rating of 7.2 from a much smaller number of votes. A film critics' rating of 7.7 from forty-two reviews places it slightly above both audience scores, indicating steady approval across critics and viewers alike.