M. Night Shyamalan

[domino harvey]

I think the consensus title would be Signs. Those who love the Village really love it (hi), but just as many hate it. The rest are extremely YMMV. Signs shows how unusual a mainstream director he is in how he doesn’t shoot coverage and edits in camera like Hitchcock. Some of the camera setups are truly bizarre (as they were in the Lady in the Water, but less effectively), but it works and the religious aspects of the film are well handled

[The Narrator Returns]

Any of the run from Sixth Sense (which I would adamantly say you’ve not heard everything about, unless Toni Collette is as big a topic of conversation as the twist) thru Village is an ideal intro, the first two being more approachable and the last two being the most complete picture of his inimitable style. If you don’t like what you see, there’s likely no chance you’ll go for his late-period, though the real heads (hi!) will go to the mat for those being among his best.

[Lowry_Sam]

My 7th sense on Sixth Sense is that knowing the big reveal going into the film undermines the film's experience and therefore one's assessment of the film. Though I do love Toni Colette so I probably will get around to it one of these days.

[tenia]

Rewatched Unbreakable a few months ago and except the very ending which feels rushed, it still works very well.

[Brian C]

My 7th sense on Sixth Sense is that knowing the big reveal going into the film undermines the film's experience and therefore one's assessment of the film. Though I do love Toni Colette so I probably will get around to it one of these days.

Well, it depends, I guess, on what you enjoy in films. If you're the kind of viewer whose experience is actually "spoiled" by spoilers, then knowing the big reveal may well fatally undermine this film for you.

But even still, I think it'd be worth a shot. The big reveal in this film is really more of an epilogue, and the film that comes before it was plenty successful even before it was revealed. If it wasn't there, it honestly wouldn't matter all that much. As I recall, I saw the film during a sneak preview before its official release, so I went in completely cold aside from the trailer, and the reveal caught me off guard precisely because I didn't anticipate that there was even a need for a big reveal. It doesn't upend the narrative or yank your feet out from under you but merely adds a layer of meaning to what you've seen.

Plus, yeah, Toni Collette is great.

[The Curious Sofa]

Shyamalan’s films tend to be more misses than hits, but I always find myself oddly hopeful for whatever he does next. I recently revisited Signs for the first time since its release, and I still think it’s pretty bad. Perhaps it’s because I’m not Christian, but the last act just falls flat. Unbreakable strikes me as unbearably ponderous, and everything from The Village to After Earth I find unwatchable.

That said, every so often he surprises me. By scaling down, The Visit became one of the stronger found-footage horror films and it’s where he finally seemed to discover a sense of humor. Split remains my favorite of his films: a funny, entertaining thriller with a smart hook and a mesmerizing central performance, it reminds me of ’80s Brian De Palma. After that, though, his movies go downhill again but Knock at the Cabin is watchable and I still haven’t gotten around to Trap.

I do like The Sixth Sense, though, and as a card-carrying member of the Toni Collette fan club, I’d say it’s worth watching for her performance alone. What’s more, on a rewatch and once famous twist is revealed, the film actually improves. It doesn’t cheat, and it’s fascinating to see how it hides its tricks in plain sight.

[knives]

I think the consensus title would be Signs. Those who love the Village really love it (hi), but just as many hate it. The rest are extremely YMMV. Signs shows how unusual a mainstream director he is in how he doesn’t shoot coverage and edits in camera like Hitchcock. Some of the camera setups are truly bizarre (as they were in the Lady in the Water, but less effectively), but it works and the religious aspects of the film are well handled

I had gotten the impression that the concensus had fallen to Unbreakable as the easy to get into masterpiece with one of Willis’ best performances?

[Murdoch]

And here I am thinking the first ten minutes of Split is the best thing he's ever done. I don't think before or since has he directed a scene as well-executed and tense. The rest of the film is pretty good too

Spoiler

although the split personalities trope is familiar ground and I think Shyamalan is at his worst when his films resort to a character with some mental health crisis that's explained away through cliched psychoanalysis.

[The Curious Sofa]

Spoiler

While split personality (or dissociative identity disorder) is a trope in psychological thrillers, I think Split does something original with it by taking it a into the supernatural (or, as the twist at he end reveals, the supervillainous.) I'd say by the end psychology is at a loss with a rational explanation of what James McAvoy's character actually is.

[Murdoch]

I just liked Shyamalan's more subdued approach to mental health in the Sixth Sense, but his more recent efforts (at least Split and Trap) lean heavily on the dangerous crazy people trappings. In Split it's admittedly the central conceit but I think it's part of a larger trend in his work toward high concept thrillers which I do enjoy but they're like watching Shyamalan swinging a sledgehammer at his audience.

[domino harvey]

I just liked Shyamalan's more subdued approach to mental health in the Sixth Sense, but his more recent efforts (at least Split and Trap) lean heavily on the dangerous crazy people trappings.

He does that in the Visit too

[Murdoch]

Oh right, that one is maybe the worst offender! It says a lot about me that I enjoyed all three at the time I saw them but then upon reflection the seams start to unravel.

[pianocrash]

His tact for casting extremely talented ensembles through the years is kind of unmentioned overall (better in his prime run of The Sixth Sense / Unbreakable / Signs / The Village / Lady In The Water) since most of those films were big time box office smashes (most of them, anyway), but are always why they tend to lift the sometimes turgid material into a place that is kind of extraordinary onscreen. The Happening is still an odd one that I tend to revisit in my mind for one particular scene (in which the troupe ventures into a model home), which toys with the parallels of their quest in such a way that just barely tips into parody before turning back into the giant slog of the rest of the picture, but that's kind of my problem.

McEvoy is tremendous in Split, though Glass is the revisit that might've been a real winner had Shyamalan decided to write a semi-decent script, but he seems to have been trying to squeeze a Marvel movie out of it instead.

Old / Knock / Trap feel most like cash grabs for the post-A24 horror audiences (Trap really began as a vehicle for his daughter, who plays a pop star in the film, but Hartnett deserves some merit) but none have the oomph of his earlier run of, comparatively, thrilling material.

[The Curious Sofa]

Oh right, that one is maybe the worst offender! It says a lot about me that I enjoyed all three at the time I saw them but then upon reflection the seams start to unravel.

Nearly every psychological thriller/horror movie ever made, from Psycho to Repulsion to The Shining to The Silence of the Lambs, is about "dangerous crazy people". I don't see what's worse about what Shyamalan does compared to others.

He's an odd filmmaker for me. I find most of his films terrible, his writing is usually to blame (he's a far better director than writer), but every so often he comes up with something genuinely great. Discounting the mid-credit sequence, Split benefits from not relying on a major plot twist and for once, its high concept is solid. His films are too often let down by chasing after some twist, which more often than not, undermines the entire film. Or they are based on a premise so daft, I question why nobody talked some sense into him before they gave him the money.

[Orlac]

We watched THE HAPPENING recently, which was ok until it fizzled out with a very "eh" ending. My wife and I thought it felt a hell of a lot like various Stephen Kings, especially CELL. Even the crazy religous lady is played by Betty Buckley (the gym teacher in CARRIE the film, Carrie's mother in the musical).

[colinr0380]

Glad to see Toni Collette being mentioned, as The Sixth Sense feels kind of the beginning of her 'harried mother' run of roles that I would group together with About A Boy, The Way Way Back, Krampus and kind of climaxing with Hereditary, which felt as if it knew exactly what it was doing by casting her in that role. I would put in a word for Olivia Williams too, who in that restaurant scene has to do a complex piece of acting to seem both surly and uncommunicative on first time around, and then heartbreakingly unable to move on when it is repeated.

We watched THE HAPPENING recently, which was ok until it fizzled out with a very "eh" ending. My wife and I thought it felt a hell of a lot like various Stephen Kings, especially CELL. Even the crazy religous lady is played by Betty Buckley (the gym teacher in CARRIE the film, Carrie's mother in the musical).

I would agree with that. The Happening is perhaps the last Shyamalan film that I really like throughout, but I think the first 'collapse of society' section of the film is the strongest, with the characters claustrophobically stuck on the train finding out reports from the outside world through their phones. But as individual scenes go, nothing beats the one of Mark Wahlberg nervously confronting a potted plant, which turns out to be made of plastic!

[The Curious Sofa]

Shyamalan did well surrounding Bruce Willis with a bunch of first class actors in The Sixth Sense, while Willis affects a vaguely constipated expression to convey melancholy grief. Toni Collette gets to play one of the best movie moms ever, Olivia Williams is very affecting having to play every scene with two meanings and Haley Joel Osment was a revelation.

The Happening on the other end was an instant bad movie classic.

[Murdoch]

Oh right, that one is maybe the worst offender! It says a lot about me that I enjoyed all three at the time I saw them but then upon reflection the seams start to unravel.

Nearly every psychological thriller/horror movie ever made, from Psycho to Repulsion to The Shining to The Silence of the Lambs, is about "dangerous crazy people". I don't see what's worse about what Shyamalan does compared to others.

I think "dangerous crazy people" is and always has been a lazy device and at no point did I say that Shyamalan's usage is worse than other examples within the genre.

[The Curious Sofa]

We'd certainly be short of a great number of genre classics without them.

[tolbs1010]

One of my favorite movie theater experiences was going to see Unbreakable with a buddy during its initial theater run. The humorless, deadly-serious presentation of what is essentially comic bookish material became funny to the audience and actually elicited howls of laughter and mocking commentary in a couple of the most 'intense' scenes. Specifically,

Spoiler

when the kid pulls a gun on Willis and when Sam Jackson is fearfully contemplating walking down the stairs and eventually falls.

It was gratifying to hear many others in the theater cracking up as much as we were. It turned a dud movie night into something memorable.

I've avoided everything he has done after The Village, but enough people have recommended the series Servant to me that I will probably watch it eventually.

[therewillbeblus]

I enjoyed Servant for the most part but it definitely loses its novelty, even while trying admirably hard to create turns to keep an intimate setting stimulating across four seasons. I’d recommend Wayward Pines first

[tolbs1010]

Siobhan Fallon Hogan in a lead role?! That definitely warrants my attention. Such a great, versatile actress. Will check it out.

[The Narrator Returns]

I’ve deleted a few things on “if you don’t have anything nice to say” grounds, so I’ll just say that that “favorite movie theater experience” would be the absolute worst time I’d ever have in a movie theater. There’s no bridging the gap between Shyamalan’s loudest dissenters and his most devoted fans, not when the latter is bawling through the movie the former are gleefully turning against.