The New Republic posts a movie review that is so funny, I had to actually open another application to give myself time to calm down. Christopher Orr's spoiler-rich "Movie Review: The Happening" (June 13, 08) successfully replicates the experience of watching a bad movie solely for comedic value.
I have a weird, weird relationship with the M. Night Shyamalan oevre. I don't find his movies particularly spooky or twisty, in part because the twists are usually broadcast from miles away, and tha's insulting. It's as if he's saying, "Ha ha! I'm leaving clues but you won't guess until the moment I reveal all!" Wrong, jackass. I usually have the ending pegged in the first act, which leaves me the remaining two for heckling. But let's not diminish the entertainment value in that. Phil and I have an entire song about Lady in the Water, which we sing to "Angel of Music," a daft duet from the fatuous Phantom of the Opera. The lyrics usually begin with Who is that lady in waaaa-ter? Why is she dripping on me? and degenerate from there. It's great fun.
Clearly, the folks at Videogum also have a weird relationship with the filmmaker vis a vis his capacity for inadvertent entertainment. Check out their M. Night Shyamalan archive, and today's offering on the RiffTrax'd best of The Sixth Sense.
The problem with Shymalan is that he just keeps trying to re-do The Sixth Sense. TSS was great, only because no one knew who Shymalan was so very few people saw the twist coming. However, people who saw it later, knowing there would be a "twist," were able to figure it out. And now, any time you see a Shymalan movie, you go in knowing there's going to be a twist, so you're looking for clues the whole way.
He needs to find a new tack.
Posted by: Julie | 2008.06.20 at 06:14
He also seems to rely on a twist rather than an actual plot. The Sixth Sense would have been a good movie even without the surprise ending, IMO, but I couldn't even watch Unbreakable, because it was so damned boring. (And stupid. The whole notion of the origins of comic-book superheros being lost in the mists of time is just laughable--Stan Lee is still alive, for Christ's sake, why don't you just ask him?)
And Signs, which is the Shyamalan movie other than Sixth Sense that I've sat all the way through, was deeply offensive to me. It sounds from the review like it's the same problem with The Happening--all these people die, but it's OK, because God decided to save Mel Gibson's pretty family! And that totally restores Mel Gibson's faith in God, because he's just that self-centered. Yay, pretty people!
Posted by: Polly | 2008.06.20 at 20:41