UK premiere of The Village - Tiscali.co.uk

Celebrities are expected to flock to Odeon West End on Tuesday to see the UK premiere of M. Night Shyamalan The Village.

Shyamalan is The Academy Award-nominated filmmaker of The Sixth Sense, Signs and Unbreakable. Celebrities expected to attend include Ray Winstone, Martin Freeman, Gillian Anderson, Natasha Bedingfield, Natasha McElhone, Gary Lucy, Matt Lucas, David Walliams, Ronnie Ancona, Isabella Hervey, Terry Gilliam and David Hare.

Writer-Director M. Night Shyamalan's "THE VILLAGE" bucked the trend of a summer dominated by sequels, adaptations and special effects driven action films, topping the US box office charts this weekend with grosses of $50.8 million, and looks set to top $100 million in the US. The LA Times calls "one of the last original voices in mainstream Hollywood" and "Hollywood's poet laureate of dread".

These figures are more remarkable for the fact that "The Village" is not reliant on a guaranteed box office draw star, a testament to the haunting spell Shyamalan has cast over cinemagoers. His fanbase has driven his last 3 films - The Sixth Sense, Signs and Unbreakable - to combined worldwide theatrical grosses of over $1.3 billion.

Bryce Dallas Howard's film debut in "The Village" marks the birth of a new Hollywood dynasty. Bryce is the daughter of Ron Howard, who directed blockbuster hits such as "A Beautiful Mind", "Ransom" and "Apollo 13", and starred as Richie Cunningham in TV's "Happy Days". Critics have heaped praise on Bryce's performance as the blind girl at the centre of "The Village". She appears next as the replacement for Nicole Kidman in "Manderlay", Lars Von Trier's sequel to "Dogville".

In M. Night Shyamalan's "The Village," the Academy Award-nominated filmmaker assembles an all-star cast, including Academy Award-nominees Joaquin Phoenix and Sigourney Weaver and Academy Award-winners Adrien Brody and William Hurt, to create the thrilling tale of an isolated village confronting the astonishing truth that lies just outside its borders.