Fan Rant: Why M. Night Shyamalan Has Nothing to Apologize for
Filed under: Fandom
By: Eugene Novikov (original publish date: June 9, 2008)
(With the Cine-staff off on a late-July mini-vacation, we thought it'd be fun to bring you some of our favorite pieces from months past. Enjoy!)
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 1)
7-29-2008 @ 5:23PM
Dave said...
I know it is after the fact, but I firmly believe that if "Signs" or "Lady in the Water" would have been his first movie, he would be hailed as the second coming of Scorsese. Those films were very good in their own right, but "not as good as The Sixth Sense". The is the same thing that happens to a lot of great bands. They have years and years to craft their first album, and it sells millions of records, then their second one they have only a year or so on the road and a year in the studio to come up with a whole other album of material, and it isn't great. It is usually good, but not great. The bar was SOOO high for Night that he will never be able to even approach it in the rest of his career. People would do well to view the Sixth Sense as the exception and not the rule and judge his other moves based on that.
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7-29-2008 @ 5:37PM
Stephen Lang said...
I don't hate on Shyamalan, in fact I eagerly await each of his movies because I'm hoping they are good.
But personally, I've found each of his succeeding movies worse and worse. Sixth Sense is really a personal favorite of mine, Unbreakable I liked. But by the time The Village and then Lady in the Water rolled around...I thought Lady in the Water was simply abysmal. As in it was the first time I sat in a theater, actually self-conscious of myself sitting there and shocked at how bad (IMHO) the movie was.
So I don't think he has anything to apologize for either. But I simply don't consider him much of a filmmaker anymore (though am still rooting for him and always willing to give him a chance.)
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7-29-2008 @ 5:38PM
uforeader said...
Glad this is back. And I continue to agree that Shyamalan has nothing to apologize for. As a HUGE fan of Night's work, I'll be the first to admit that The Happening was his weakest movie. He tried to go for a tongue-in-cheek B-horror movie with comedy and scares mixed together. I think the opening act was so heavy in tone, that when the tone began to lighten up and become funny, people thought it was unintentional. He was very successful in mixing humor with scares in Signs, but in Lady and Happening he has been less successful.
I like that he's a risk-taker. Nothing he makes is like anything else. In fact, I would say Sixth Sense is his least original work... it was more like a classic ghost/mystery story. Or maybe I just feel that way because so many of the movies today are modeled after The Sixth Sense.
I personally find Signs to be his best movie (ironically, it's Night's least favorite of his films). I love to watch it over and over to see how he sets up the revelation at the end and how he plays with the audience's mind with expert sound design, cinematography, and direction.
He'll be making movies for a long time, and I'll be there opening night for all of them!
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7-29-2008 @ 9:42PM
Jim said...
I thought signs was awesome. Especially the ending. It made me think of the climax of A Prayer for Owen Meaney where each aspect of the main characters' personality and interactions throughout the story came into play. I actually liked it better than the Sixth Sense.
Signs, however, was the last Shyamalan movie I saw. Sort of lost interest.
Someday he's gonna pull a rabbit out of his considerably large hat and all the naysayers will become believers again. At least, that's my hope.
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7-29-2008 @ 10:17PM
Cray said...
I don't think its fair to judge him on these films because none of the films are alike. Although there is one major theme that he's constantly trying to reinvent, that is the revelation or the payoff. Sometimes it's a hit other times you are scratching your head. I don't think its his fault if you're scratching your head trying figure out why it didn't grab you like his other films. Thats why he's done a wider variety of genre films while keeping to whole 'revelation' thing he obviously enjoys doing.
You're either going to like some films or not, but it doesn't make him a bad filmmaker.
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7-30-2008 @ 1:43AM
Eric said...
I guess I am the minority here. I've throroughly enjoyed all of Night's movies - including the much (and wrongly) maligned "Lady in the Water". I love the films for numerous reasons, not least of all because Night has the balls to break the mold each time. Fine example: in "Unbreakable" one of the key scenes is the train wreck. In the hands of a less canny filmmaker, the scene would have been an over long mess of screaming metal, decapitations, hysterical passengers, tortured landscapes. Night bypasses this obvious method by giving us glimpses of the wreck from OUTSIDE - as a news cast on a television screen which seems almost incidental as it happens. Then we get the true gift of the slow reveal that our "Hero" was on the train and survived. It was a terrific bit of filmmaking, in and of itself worth the price of admission.
I have also found that his films open up like onions with successive viewings. Like great paintings, Shyamalan's films can be deeply rewarding if you see them many times. There are always levels of detail not apparent the first time through.
A good example of this is "Signs"
The first time I saw "Signs", there was one scene that seemed merely strange and disorienting - where the little girl goes to her father saying "there's a monster in my room - can I have a glass of water?" At that point the line is funny and disorienting but essentially meaningless. In the last few minutes of the film when the importance of water is made clear, that line suddenly carries a lot of weight and when I watched the film a second, knowing what it meant and what was about to happen, it sent chills down my spine.
"Lady in the Water" is wonderful for many reasons, not least the casting of Paul Giamatti and Bryce Howard in the leads- Giamatti is never less than fascinating onscreen, and Howard can be mesmerising!
But it also has the added charm of unfolding like many of the campfire stories I used to tell many years ago when I worked as a counseller - stories where you take a few leads from traditional fairytales, jokes, or horror stories and improvise from them. Sometimes the stories fall apart in mid process, but as often as not they'd take on a life all their own and go places that you can't possibly find any other way.
I succumbed to the lure of "The Happening" and I have to say that I was not disappointed. I found the movie engrossing, intelligent, elegantly paced, and enigmatic. I'm looking forward to the DVD release so that I can watch it again and really dig into its layers.
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7-30-2008 @ 7:44AM
xdonniex said...
Maybe the reviews lowered my expectations on "The Happening" (a friend mentioned that it was worst than LITW!) but I thought it was very good. Didn't say great but well worth seeing. Okay, fine, the third act isn't strong and the coda is predictable but still the work of an interesting filmmaker.
I look forward to Mr. Shyamalan's next film
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