Fan Rant: Why M. Night Shyamalan Has Nothing to Apologize for
When it comes to seeing M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening early, the best that Fox publicists can offer me (and other non-daily-newspaper press in Philadelphia) is a 9 pm screening at an inconvenient theater the night before release. I'm going to politely decline, and it's probably just as well. It's become so hip to hate and sneer at Shyamalan and his films that I'm not sure I could handle the pre- and post-screening small talk. I'll see the film on Friday afternoon, alone, or with a friend who's not privy to the buzz and the gossip.
Those who've read my stuff, here and elsewhere, know that I'm one of the more persistent Shyamalan apologists on the intertubes. I won't launch into a defense of specific films here; that's too formidable a task for a Fan Rant. Instead, I want to briefly discuss why I think it's wrong to make the filmmaker into either a laughingstock or public enemy #1, even if you're not enamored of his recent efforts.
I'll make a couple of concessions at the beginning, to show I'm reasonable. Concession the first: I admit that Lady in the Water was a failure. An interesting failure, and one I was able to enjoy on second viewing when I was no longer blinded by disappointment, but a failure nonetheless. Concession the second: when Shyamalan's worldview wrests center stage away from his storytelling chops, the results can be cringe-worthy (e.g. the ending of the otherwise-excellent Signs; most of Lady). Certain things in the advertising for The Happening make me nervous about this.
So, as with most filmmakers who take risks, there are problems. But that's the thing: Shyamalan takes risks, consistently. How many staunchly mainstream filmmakers can say that? Every movie he's made has offered something interesting: A clever conceptual twist on a familiar plot (Signs), a deconstruction of an entire genre (Unbreakable), a political allegory buried under thriller trappings (The Village), a statement on destiny and meaning (Lady in the Water), and of course the mind-blowing surprise ending that got him his career (The Sixth Sense). I think The Village is head-spinningly brilliant, and Unbreakable is one of my favorite movies of the decade, but you don't have to agree with that -- as I say, even I think that Lady in the Water ultimately doesn't work. What I'm trying to say is this: Is a guy who is constantly trying to make personal and unique movies within the studio system really the filmmaker who deserves your scorn?
Yes, I know that he has a zeppelin-sized ego. He's still young, it'll pass; the fact that The Happening is 90 minutes long seems like a step in the right direction. (And who says a little arrogance is a bad thing, anyway?) I know some people think he's a one-trick pony, with the one trick being the twist ending; those people are simply wrong, as evidenced by Signs, Lady, and even The Village, where the "twist" isn't particularly surprising, and isn't supposed to be. Most viewers think Unbreakable has a "twist ending," but the twist there is more thematic than narrative. Shyamalan is a writer and director who understands that good stories should be able to surprise you, but he has a sizable arsenal of ways in which to do it.
I realize it's a little disingenuous for me to imply that I'd be thinking and writing the same thing were I not a fan of the man's work; I probably wouldn't be. But I do think that the recent Shyamalan "backlash" (thanks to Scott Weinberg for pointing me to this thoughtless nonsense (my words, not Scott's) from the New York Post, for example) has served to punish ambition. His undeniable technical chops should be enough to dispel any notion that Shyamalan is a "hack," but there's more: he makes movies that try to offer us something. He doesn't always succeed; I hear you. But does he really deserve the recent treatment he's received in the press? Why aren't we saving any of it for the Rob Cohens and Michael Bays of the world?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 5)
6-09-2008 @ 10:47PM
John said...
Well put. You summed up my thoughts on the matter (though I don't necessarily think Lady was a failure.)
Here's lookin' to The Happening. Screw the Hulk.
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6-09-2008 @ 10:47PM
Rufus said...
I agree bud.
I have to say (though seemingly in the minority) I have enjoyed all of M. Night's films. I enjoyed The Sixth Sense, loves Unbreakable, was freaked out by the party-alien-scene in Signs and call me thick, did not see the twist in The Village coming.
As for Lady in the Water, I could watch Paul Giamatti paint a wall, so it was all good and fine for me.
I'd see The Happening (if I didn't have a baby and could GET to the theatre ;)
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6-10-2008 @ 9:47AM
Gustavo Brunetti said...
I completely agree with you, but I'd like to add that I'd see Bryce Dallas Howard paint a wall too.
Oh, and I don't have a baby, so I'm on my way to The Happening.
6-11-2008 @ 3:29PM
stevec said...
I always find his movies at least refreshingly offbeat... Unbreakable was unfortunately overlooked due to the immensity of its predessesor. It was a great movie on many levels and a classic. I remember one critic say that Bruce Willis walked through the script like a zombie. I think it's called acting and that critic apparently missed the whole point of the movie - the contrast of a life without meaning vs. a life lived "doing what you're supposed to be doing" couldn't have been better portrayed. James Newton Howards score was genius. I don't know what it takes with some people...
Night challenges you and is not everyones cup of joe, so be it. I'm glad at least some people appreciate a genuine attempt to uplift and challenge an audience to think beyond the mundane...
6-09-2008 @ 11:02PM
Erik said...
yeah. M Night Shyamalan's work is pretty interesting to me, and as for his arrogance, i couldn't really tell he had any, which means he either probably hides it well or i haven't seen any of his interviews. Actually, Lady in the Water is my favorite of his movies so far, despite its flaws. The only one i didn't really like was The Village because it was similair to this book i read in elementary school plus he gave away the twists too fast or not in his usual style so it kind of felt like, i was ready at the beginning but by the end, everything was like sucked dry and it just ended *raspberry* with nothing left. no offense to any Village fans though. Though every good director has to go through a bad movie once in a while anyway. Steven Spielberg did, Robert Zemeckis did, and M Night did. i figure The Happening will be his come back {phew, sorry about the long post}
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6-09-2008 @ 11:14PM
Jim said...
Part of the reason M. Night gets so much crap is that he IS the guy with the twist/surprise/unexpected/unusual endings - EVERY ONE OF HIS FILMS. If he were to just make one move - one - without that intentional shocker of ending, viewers would accept him more. Why you ask? Because he has done this to us so many times, that it makes us feel like he's got something on us. He thinks he's smarter than us. He's gone from making a film FOR us with a surprise ending that we thank him for (Sixth Sense), to making films with endings that either leave us scratching our heads or make us feel like he's talking (through his films) down to us or simply disappoint us because the twist is downright silly has ruined everything that came before it (Signs had a WONDERFUL creepy feel/story going on, but M. Night just isn't that great a writer to sustain that through the final act...the ending was just plain stupid and seemed to philosophize too much about destiny and fate and all that crap).
I have gone ahead and read spoilers on The Happening, and HOLY CRAP...the surprise ending (oh, I'm sorry...was that a spoiler? A surprise ending in a M. Night movie? I'm sorry I ruined it for you) is going to annoy movie goers to no end.
As for Michael Bay, trust me - I have plenty of scorn left over for him.
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6-09-2008 @ 11:23PM
Eugene Novikov said...
>>>>>he IS the guy with the twist/surprise/unexpected/unusual endings - EVERY ONE OF HIS FILMS.
Except that's just not true. I mean, "unexpected" and "unusual," maybe, but those are unequivocally good things -- are you looking for "ordinary" and "par for the course"? As for "twist" and "surprise," neither "Signs" nor "Lady in the Water" fit that definition.
6-09-2008 @ 11:25PM
Gina said...
Yes! Beautifully written, Eugene. That's exactly the sort of thing I'm always wanting to say to Shyamalan detractors, only you put it much better than I would have. Thank you!
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6-09-2008 @ 11:26PM
Randall said...
While I'm not sure how or why hating on Shyamalan has become hip as you put it, I'm definitely not a fan of Shyamalan's work. His directing is fine, it's just that to me his films are trying too hard. Yes, he uses twists in a lot of his films, but that's not the problem; the problem is that the plot twists are just plain lousy. The ones that don't have a twist just lead to an uninspired ending. I often enjoy the "middle" of his films, but the endings always seem to ruin the movie for me. They haven't gotten any better, either. For some reason, I don't see any improvement when it comes to his films. I just find that mediocre movies shouldn't be praised as great films. If Shyamalan didn't write his movies, I think his directing would only get better; I think his writing is holding him back.
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6-09-2008 @ 11:28PM
eugene said...
what a joke. M Night Shyamalan is a pretentious hack who's been riding the success of Sixth Sense for the past decade. Why do people hate his movies? Because, from the moment you sit down, you're trying to figure out the "twist" and while the twsit in Sixth Sense was organic to the story and actually added depth to the otherwise shallow and predictable story, the same can not be said for his other movies.
As for this nonsensical claim that there isn't enough scorn out there for michael bay... that's hilarious. It's like you don't even bother reading this site. This site can't post a single story that has anything even remotely to do with Bay without heaping on the scorn and ridicule.
However, I will say this for michael bay... he knows that he's the guy for filming explosions and juvenlie humor... he doesn't pretend he's some sort of film god here to raise the art to new levels... like M. Nigh SHAM-alan.
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6-10-2008 @ 10:20AM
The Pepto Pimp said...
Don't take your frustration with your own failures out on legendary filmmakers.
6-10-2008 @ 1:44PM
eugene said...
Bwahahahaha. The only thing legendary about either of them is their ego.
6-09-2008 @ 11:31PM
Pat said...
No, Shyamalan is more or less a hack. You're wrong. Sorry.
The only film I really like of his is Unbreakable, because I'm a comic nerd. Every other thing he's done (yes, I include Sixth Sense here) is vapid, pretentious drivel - actually, even Unbreakable is pretentious drivel, but I direct you again to the "I'm a comic nerd" defense.
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6-09-2008 @ 11:57PM
ssaammss said...
I started off being a fan of Shyamalan's films, and didn't care about the twists at the end. I thought (and still think) that Unbreakable is one of the best films made in this decade.
One of my biggest problems with him is his annoying insistence at casting himself as front-and-center characters in his films. Not only is his presence a major distraction, but he's not even a decent actor... and in the case of Lady in the Water, he had the audacity to openly aggrandize his stature as a writer by having the main character tell his character that his writings would one day change the world. Such an immense pile of egomaniacal garbage.
I won't be seeing The Happening in the theaters... after the train wreck that was Lady in the Water (which followed the previous train wreck called The Village), I refuse to support any more of his meandering, self-important cinema diatribes. The guy needs to take a step back, direct a film from a script he didn't write, and work in a genre that takes on another flavor besides morose and mysterious (I'm not sure if the Airbender film will really help on this front).
And for god sake, someone please stop the guy from ever getting back in front of the camera again...
p.s. The one really great thing about all of his films is that they always come along with a terrific score from James Newton Howard, which is always a welcome side benefit... that man works very hard to make those films cohesive, and all of his scores for Shyamalan's films are standalone gems.
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6-10-2008 @ 7:51PM
Vince said...
Totally agree with your assessment of M. Night, the actor. His directing is fine. His writing is sometimes uneven and his acting, just plain annoying.
It was okay when the parts were a bit like Hitchcock cameos, but please, no more starring / speaking roles.
And I am a fan frustrated he doesn't do better. He has great potential. Probably peaked too early with 6th sense.
6-10-2008 @ 12:06AM
Kevin said...
Unless, by "deconstruction" you mean an alternate reading or perspective on the genre - which is all that movie is - (and from your apparent affinity, I don't think that's what you meant to say) I think that to say Unbreakable is a "deconstruction of an entire genre" is completely ridiculous. The movie owes the entirety of its substance to its genre. It was an interesting take on a conventional story, and for that reason, among a few others, I'd consider it his best. But it's that play on convention that makes it interesting; far from a deconstruction, in the sense that you mean it. In fact I'd consider it more a reinforcement if anything. Without its genre, Unbreakable is a piece of garbage. You're giving him way too much credit.
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6-10-2008 @ 12:10AM
Eugene Novikov said...
I meant what I said. It takes the genre apart into its elements and holds them up to the light.
6-10-2008 @ 12:15AM
Eugene Novikov said...
Though, on second thought, I agree that "deconstruction" might not be the best term. What I'm looking for is probably more in the vein of "intense analytical exploration."
6-10-2008 @ 12:27AM
Kevin said...
To reply to the article:
any movie that you would describe as "interesting," I would expect to be at the very least captivating in some way, particularly past a first viewing. Granted, he may be a talented filmmaker and has definitely had well-earned success in the past, but any movie that fails to captivate me past a first watch is not interesting.
Twists work when they tie the plot together in an intelligent way - something you don't necessarily expect, but something that maintains the integrity of the story (The Sixth Sense, to use a relevant example). Twists do not work when they completely change the entire context of the story. When, because I know the whole time the woods is actually really close to the highway, I can't bear to watch the movie a second time, that's really aggravating, even more so from someone who claims to be making "interesting" films. People hate his twists because they're most times irrelevant to the story; simple artifice employed to fool the viewer. Why should I ever be engaged by a story if I know that its purpose is to fool me? What's really interesting about his films is that they have a good way of tricking people into not thinking, at first, that they're just watching another shock mongering piece of shit.
Also, if I were writing anything that might show up on a film site bearing any kind of relevance or clout in terms of reviews, coverage, etc. (e.g. this one), then I'd hesitate to describe this particular filmmaker's work as "intense analytical exploration." I'm not necessarily questioning the breadth of your film knowledge, but I'd think that if you had seen any number of other films that are actually closer to the analysis you seem to be referring to, you'd never write something like that about M. Night Shyamalan.
6-10-2008 @ 12:34AM
eugene said...
hah. There's nothing about Unbreakable that is "intense analytical exploration". It's a mere rehashing of tried and true, even cliched, silver age "rules" of creating and writing for a superhero shoehorned into a modern setting.
The most you can say for the movie is that M. Night managed to introdue silver age story telling to a generation who think that comics begin with the Avengers and end with the X-men.