What is it about tedium that makes it so goddamn annoying? Whenever I take on a daunting task, like losing weight, or to a much lesser degree, like washing my car, I do so with an uncharacteristically optimistic vigor or, dare I say, moxie. However, when it comes to a seemingly simple, easy chore, like washing the dishes, taking out the trash, or in this case, tying my shoes, I couldn't be MORE BOTHERED! Seriously, when I look down, and see my shoes are untied, I immediately hear the classical music piece "Night on Bald Mountain" playing (which has NOTHING to do with the fact that I'm bald... okay, well maybe a little...).
I want to get on my knees, and scream to the heavens that have forsaken me to have to get on the dirt, like an animal, and tie my shoe (especially if the laces are wet with rain and mud - ARGH!). Even if I'm at my apartment, about to go out, I look at the act of tying my shoes with great trepidation, which could make or break whether I even end up going out. I have to think to myself, "Hmm, will going out tonight even be worth the effort of tying my shoes? I just don't know..."
Some of you are, no doubt, thinking, "Are you really that lazy?" In most cases, the answer is YES. However, what you are not considering is that I'm a tall fellow, and hunching down to tie my shoes can be as much a strain as doing toe touches which, essentially, I am doing. I suppose I could hike my leg up on a chair or something, but even that feels like too much effort. I guess I wouldn't mind shoelaces so much if they didn't get frayed and nasty so quickly! Every pair of shoes I've ever owned, the ends of my shoelaces usually get frayed within months, making them doubly annoying to deal with.
My question is, with all the technology we have at our disposal, where the hell are those shoes with the power laces that Marty McFly puts on in Back to the Future II?
Two years ago, my brother gave me a pair of loafers without shoelaces, which was, and continues to be, one of the best gifts in my life. I love slipping on shoes, and not even worrying about cumbersome strings in the first place. I can't express to you the feeling of liberation that sweeps over me every time I put laceless shoes on. Sometimes, when I'm bored, or depressed, I just put my shoes on and take them off, to remind myself that, while things may suck now, at least I'm no longer enslaved by shoelaces.
That isn't to say that I don't brush my teeth regularly. I certainly see the value of good oral hygiene. I just hate the process. I remember, as a kid, going to a dental seminar, where an oral hygienist demonstrated the correct way to brush teeth using a fake skull and a comically oversize toothbrush. She brushed to the rhythm "Peter's theme" from Peter and the Wolf, explaining the process from a song she improvised.
Listen to that music at the beginning, and imagine a perky young woman with a pixie haircut, bobbing left to right, singing: "Brush brush, against the gums, against the gums, it's really fun, make your teeth shiny and new!"
Her over-the-top, chipper singing, along with Peter and the Wolf, whilst brushing a skull with a clownish toothbrush set a surreal, yet eerily disturbing, atmosphere. I can't help but feel the use of a terrifying skull was a mistake. I came away from the experience feeling that brushing one's teeth is already a tedious process, without having to add song and fanfare to the mix. Worst of all, I hated the feel of the bristles against my gums! Every time I'd brush my teeth, I'd feel as if my gums were torn apart, and I'd taste blood in my mouth. I'd go to bed with the pain I had inflicted on my teeth, throbbing away in my brain.
No matter how many times I'd brush my teeth, it never seemed to really help. I'd go to the dentist, and he's "tsk tsk tsk" me about all the plaque that had built up on my teeth. Then he'd suggest I floss regularly, which, while I'm on the subject, is total bullshit. Floss had to have been conceived by someone with intense OCD. I mean, using string to get the gunk out from between your teeth? So, it's not enough that we have to brush our teeth obsessively TWICE a fucking day, but now we have to clean BETWEEN them as well? Why do we even have teeth if they are so brittle that this much effort is necessary just to maintain them???? AAARGH!
Brushing for me consists of front, back, side-to-side, rinse, spit, done in under 2 minutes.
Just look at that thing... it looks like it would eat your whole family, if it could.
Some of you may be thinking, "What the hell do you have against staple removers? They serve a functional purpose!" Bullshit. They serve the same function as your finger nails, except they make even more of a goddamn mess! You originally use a staple remover to simply remove a staple, and before you know, the fucking thing has devoured your entire report and shredded it to pieces!
They are arguably the most threatening, lethal-looking pieces of office equipment I've ever seen. They kind of remind me of Baxter Stockman's Mousers from Teenager Mutant Ninja Turtles:
If Google ever developed sentience and decides to destroy humanity, as I'm sure it will one day, I bet it'd create floating schools of robots modeled after staple removers, designed to go around and strip the flesh of any human they see. They will be called "Human Removers", and this time, they are designed to make a mess as they fulfill their function.
Okay, I admit it - this topic is fucking boring me more than The Last Airbender, so I decided to cut the shit, and finally end this so I can move on to something more interesting, like staple removers (which is, for real, my next topic).
That's alright, though, because discussing what I hate about M. Night Shyamalan doesn't have to take up as many parts as what I love about him, because so many of his films, post-Unbreakable have the similar elements that make me hate them. So let's get to it, shall we?
First of all, Shyamalan's ego begins to take over at this point. I suppose that will happen when everyone is calling you "the next Hitchcock". Not only is it gratifying to be compared to one of the greatest film directors of all time, but that last part, "cock", is surely subconscious fuel for the male ego. These comparisons were drawn mostly because of Shyamalan's tendency for surprise endings, although Hitchcock was only famous for surprise endings because of Psycho mostly. I haven't seen his entire library of movies, but the ones I have seen did not have surprise endings. What they did have was perfect pacing and incredibly suspenseful moments. The scene in Rear Window when Jimmy Stewart sends his girlfriend to investigate the murderer's apartment across the street, with the murderer about to catch her, is one of the most suspenseful moments in movie history.
At some point, back when he made The Sixth Sense, Shyamalan seemed to understand how to create a suspenseful scene. Now, though, it seems like all he knows is how to come up with a neat concept, and... that's about it. I remember when The Village was about to come out, I was actually kind of looking forward to it. The concept seemed neat - a small, roughly 16th century town makes a pact with spooky forest dwellers, which is broken when one of their own trespasses into the woods. Okay, sure, I'll watch that. Then the twist happens, and it so absurd as to be laughable: they were actually living in the modern times, and the elders dressed like spooks to scare the youth from trying to leave the village. Horrible.
Then there was the climax on Signs. Graham's (Mel Gibson) house is invaded by an alien, and in a moment of desperation, he remembers his wife's enigmatic dying words: "Tell Merrill to swing away." So he tells his brother, Merrill (Joaquin Phoenix), to swing away. Merrill grabs a baseball bat, and starts wailing away at the alien, who just take it like total puss. Then, completely by accident, he knocks over one of many glasses of water Graham's son has been leaving around the house, and it burns the alien like acid. Really? This is the big solution the entire movie was leading up to? Beating the alien with a baseball bat and melting it with water? And if the aliens were fatally allergic to water, why the hell would they invade a planet that is almost completely MADE OF WATER! Also, not to get too super science on you, but sentient life, as we know it, is impossible to develop without water. When NASA sends probes to find new planets that can sustain life, one of the things they look for, first and foremost, is water (ok, and also a sun, but you know what I mean). One more thing: why are aliens almost always nude in these movies? They can create intergalactic spaceships, but clothes somehow elude them. Wait... isn't that a Seinfeld bit?
Then there's Lady in the Water... jesus, is this a horrible movie. Say what you will about Signs and The Village, at those were kind of watchable, but Lady in the Water was just a fucking mess. Shyamalan says that the movie is based off a bedtime story he tells his kids, and as sleepy as it made me, I can believe it. The movie is about a groundskeeper named Cleveland Heep, one of the worst names in a movie this side of Appalonia Jane, who finds that a mysterious young woman named Story, played by Bryce Dallas Howard, has been living in his pool. By the way, I stand corrected: Story is the stupidest name I've ever seen. He finds out that she's some kind of water nymph who somehow washed up into our world and needs help getting back to her's, before evil, dog-like creatures get her. Cleveland than goes on to recruit people that live in his apartment building that are all totally unlikable and annoying, to help Story out. After that, it gets fuzzy, because by this point in the movie, my rage, apathy, and boredom completely clouded my senses, and before I knew it, the end credits were rolling. What pissed me off the most about this film was why, in the name of love, would Shyamalan think that some bullshit bedtime story he tells his kids to make them shut the fuck up and GO TO SLEEP, would be an awesome movie??
Then came The Happening, which is about an epidemic of suicides that infect the East coast of the United States. My early theory was that the people were committing suicide because they had just watched Lady in the Water, but I turned out to be wrong. It was something much stupider: in a form of natural defense against mankind's pollution of Earth, all the plants were expelling some kind of airborne toxin that infects a person's brain and makes them kill themselves, proving once again that Mother Nature can be a total bitch.
I need to take a moment here to point out just how stupid this title is, by the way. "The Happening"? Really? Normally, after one finishes a script, and can't figure out a good title because the plot isn't focused enough to provide one naturally, that is taken as a bad sign. I can see it now - M. Night finishes the last page and he's thinking, "Okay, the movie is about a mysterious epidemic of suicides... so I should call it... Suicide Epidemic? No. Earth's Revenge? No, that'll spoil my clever twist. The People Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-up Suicidals? No, too long. Let's see... what is happening in the script... what is happening to the characters... happening... happening... hey, I know! The Happening - because, in the movie, things are happening! Yesss!"
This movie wasn't as awful as Lady in the Water, but that's like saying dry dog shit is better than wet dog shit. Shit is shit, and a bad movie is a bad movie, the only difference is one will leave a worse stain on you soul than the other. The only thing I found interesting about this movie is that, for the first time ever in a Shyamalan film, it is incredibly gory. As crude as it may sound, that was enough to keep my interest, although the movie eventually peters out and has a bullshit happy ending.
Last, but not least, we have The Last Airbender. Oooooh my, where do I start? First of all, don't judge the Nickelodeon series from which the movie is based off of from this shitty film. That series is actually really good. It has a lot of well choreographed action sequences, lovable characters, and hilarious moments, mixed up with truly tense, dramatic moments. It's an amazing adventure through a magical land where being able to control the elements is as normal as breathing. So, in essence, Avatar: The Last Airbender is absolutely antithetical to everything M. Night Shyamalan has ever made. So, of course, why not have him direct it???
What Shyamalan produces from an otherwise great series, is a completely uninspired, insipidly dull, heartless piece of shit movie. He has a lot of the imagery from the series completely right, but the characters are totally wrong. Ang is a boring little shit, played by an child actor who, like most child actors, completely sucks at acting. All the other characters are just as uninteresting, mostly because we don't really get a chance to get to know them. The movie just churns along, the characters traveling from place to place, with little to know time to develop them. Also, the movie's story is mostly told via voice over, which is always the red flag of a shitty script. The number one, number one, rule of directing a film is: show the story, don't tell the story. Filmmaking is, first and foremost, a visual media, and a talented director is capable of utilizing visuals to tell his story with little to no dialogue. Don't get me wrong, dialogue is important, but only as a means of developing the plot. An entire movie could be silent, and yet still be totally engaging - I know, I've seen it done. I've watched plenty of silent films that are absolutely amazing. Once upon a time, Shyamalan used to know this, but The Last Airbender makes me think he either forgot it, or he was so desperate for a paycheck, he just didn't give a fuck about making a good movie, so long as it makes money in the box office.
I think that's what I hate about Shyamalan most of all: the lack of passion that he displayed so much of in The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. It's as if his passion for filmmaking got replaced with a constant need to reaffirm to himself how brilliant he is, by putting more brainpower into coming up with original concepts, instead of ways to makes these concepts actually work. The problem with a movie about a village of neo-Luddites who have decided to hide from the modern world by making their kids believe they are trapped by forest creatures is neat, but Shyamalan is incapable of making it work as a movie. The concept of plants forcing people to kill themselves is neat, but Shyamalan is, once again, incapable of making it work as a movie.
It's a real shame, because as you read in parts 1 and 2 of this saga, I really thought a lot of Shyamalan as a director, and to see how far he's sunk is a little heartbreaking. It sucks that the man responsible for a movie as great as The Sixth Sense is now so synonymous with garbage movies that when his name flashes on a movie screen, entire audiences groan with disgust (I've been in a movie theater when this has happened, it was quite hilarious). I really hope that he pulls himself out of this nosedive, but I feel like it's much too late at this point. Unless he writes a sequel to one of his more successful films, like Unbreakable (which, rumor has it, he plans to do), I don't see many more films in this guy's future, which might be for the best.
In 2000, Shyamalan released his next eagerly anticipated film, Unbreakable, again teaming up with Sixth Sense star, Bruce Willis, who would be also teaming up again with his Diehard with a Vengeance costar, Samuel L. Jackson. A lot of reunions going on in this movie... brings a tear to me eye.
The movie is about a security guard named David Dunn, who survives a train crash without any injury whatsoever. This captures the attention of an eccentric entrepreneur named Elijah Price, who is stricken with an ailment that makes his bones extremely brittle. Price's logic is that if someone like him can exist, who is so easily broken, then someone must exist who is his extreme opposite, and can't be hurt by anything. He believes this to be David, and begins pushing David to accept his destiny as an invincible super-hero of sorts.
I remember being really anxious to see the movie because the trailer was really mysterious. It never really hinted at why David survived the crash, only that he did, and you would have to come see the movie to find out why. So, having absolutely loved The Sixth Sense, I saw Unbreakable on the opening weekend and was absolutely stunned at how good the movie was. First of all, the whole superhero angle hit me out of left field, but fucking loved it. Second of all, the theme of accepting one's destiny resonated with me more in this movie than it did in The Sixth Sense.
It was my first year of college, and I was living on my own for the first time in my life. Also, by this point in time, my hair was falling out en masse, and I was no longer able to hide the fact that I was going bald from the world, or myself. Socially, college was beginning to feel a bit too much like high school, with people splitting into cliques almost immediately, and every girl that I met who I felt remotely attracted too could care less about me (or so I perceived it, but in those years, my self-esteem was in the red). I hated my classes, I hated my job (I was a night clerk for my dorm), and I felt abysmally alone. I had no clue what my purpose in life was, who I was as a person, and more importantly, who I wanted to be.
In essence, at that point, I felt almost exactly like David Dunn felt. Hell, I was even bald like him too. By the way, I will admit, Bruce Willis' shaved look for this role, and my identification with his character, is a big inspiration for what made me decide to start shaving my own head. Also, after watching this movie, I started writing funny joke ideas and premises in a notepad, with hopes of someday being a stand-up comic - an aspiration I would go on to actualize about 5 years later.
Anyway, Unbreakable turned out not only to be a great movie, but the right movie for me at the time. It's a movie about how a person can be far too accepting of self-imposed limitations, blinding them to their amazing potential. It's also just a really awesome superhero movie. There are so many great scenes, I feel like discussing them all would be overkill... but I'm going to try.
My favorite scene is when David finally steps up as the hero he was meant to be, and saves a couple of kids from a killer, who has already murdered their parents. Part of what makes this scene so powerful is the incredible music, by James Newton Howard, that swells as David saves the day. This particular piece of music, entitled "The Orange Man", was destined for my MP3 player:
I want to mention, by the way, how I loved that David's rain poncho just seamlessly, and organically, becomes his superhero costume as well. My other favorite scene is the one right after, when David sits down to breakfast with his family, and discreetly pushes a newspaper to his son. The front page story is about a mysterious hero saving some kids from a killer. Throughout the movie, David's son has been pressuring him to accept his superhero identity. The kid looks hopefully up at David, who nods an affirmative, and mouths the words, "You were right". Tears begin welling up in his son's eyes. I will admit, tears were kind of welling up in my eyes as well, but I'm a big softy... or pussy, whatever word you prefer.
Finally, my other favorite scene is when David accepts his superhero role and goes out looking for people to save. Once again, Howard's music really helps embellish this scene, but it's also just filmed really well:
Shyamalan once again used a mostly drab color tone to offset brighter colors when they are supposed to symbolize something - in The Sixth Sense it symbolized the presence of a ghost. In this movie, it symbolizes that a person is less than scrupulous (which makes Elijah's revelation at the end not very surprising, being that he favored purple so much).
Speaking of Elijah's revelation, I will say that the movie is, by no means, perfect. The story about David's failing marriage was boring, probably because the actress who played his wife was, herself, boring. Every scene between the two of them felt as if both actors drank a gallon of Nyquil before each take. Plus, it was way too reminiscent of the subplot involving Dr. Crowe's marital problems in The Sixth Sense. Another scene that was just plain absurd is the one in which David's son threatens to shoot David to prove that he's invincible. It's supposed to be an intensely emotional scene, but it just comes off as over-the-top and unnecessary. I'm sorry, but any kid that would hold a gun to his father, in the belief that his dad is a superhero, whether he's misguided or not, is either dumb or crazy. I'm surprised they didn't ship this kid out to Boystown after that stunt.
The last thing that bugged me was the ending. Clearly, Shyamalan was feeling cocky that he had come up with such a smart twist in The Sixth Sense, he felt like he had to do it again. The twist in Unbreakable (spoil alert!) is that Elijah Price was the one that caused the train David rode on to crash. In fact, Price had committed a number of atrocities, among which are the bombing of a commercial jet plane, as well as burning down a hotel, all in the attempt to find David (or someone with his abilities). While this was an interesting turn, it was a lot more predictable than the previous movie's twist, and it felt somewhat antithetical to the point of the film. So, now that David knows he's been working at the behest of an insane murderer, will he continue moonlighting as a superhero? I'm just saying, this twist kind of completely undermines David's journey of self-discovery a wee bit. Wouldn't it be better if the train was just an accident, and Elijah continues being the Professor X to David Dunn's X-Man? Sure, it's interesting to think Elijah goes on to become David's arch-nemesis, but what's the point unless there's going to be another movie to explore this?
Speaking of which, Shyamalan has talked about making a sequel for years, but has finally began seriously pursuing it. No doubt, because a sequel to Unbreakable just might be Shyamalan's only hope of breaking the streak of shitty movies he's made over the last few years. While The Sixth Sense is clearly the better made film, Unbreakable has a lot more heart, and is, in my opinion, Shyamalan's masterpiece. It's also the last great film he'd make before his fall to the dark side...
Have you ever tried to love someone? Have you pinned your hopes and dreams on somebody, however unfairly, only for them to fail you in every way imaginable? I think we all have experienced this, and it's usually referred to as an "ex".
Well, I'm not going to talk about exes right now, although I certainly have a lot to say about that topic, so I'll save it for a rainy day. The kind of love I'm specifically referring to is more like a deep admiration for someone that is later found, through constant disappointment, to have been grievously misplaced. This is how I feel about M. Night Shyamalan.
Anyone that knows me, or is a regular reader of my blog, is aware of the vitriol I feel towards Shyamalan, but not many realize that it is a hate that was born out of love, much like the hate that drove Anakin to the Dark Side... and if that doesn't make sense, blame the Star Wars prequels. There was a time where I would have happily considered myself an M. Night fan, and I would see all of his movies in theater the very weekend it was released. Then again, there was a time I would have considered a Pepperoni Roll from the Minute Mart a "delicacy", so I guess as we mature, so do our tastes - which is the core to M. Night's problem, I think. The guy refuses to grow as a filmmaker, or at least, all of his attempts to grow have been ill-thought out at best.
The best way to really understand my hate of M. Night is to briefly run through his filmography and illustrate how far he has fallen as a filmmaker. Follow me into Hell.
The Sixth Sense
This is undeniably one of Shyamalan's best movies, if not *the* best (though that is debatable - personally I'm more partial to Unbreakable, which I'll get into momentarily). The movie has a premise that could be considered rather hackneyed in the horror genre: a child has a supernatural gift that allows him to see dead people. I mean, what's that about? I've seen dead people - big fucking deal! I went to my grandpa's funeral, and he just laid there in the casket doing nothing. My family has still not forgiven me for heckling "booooooring" at him, but he did the same thing in my high graduation, so fuck it.
Oh, wait, the kid in The Sixth Sense could see ghosts? Oh. Well, that's still not that original - the kid in The Shining could see ghosts as well, and that movie was ten times better. Also, this movie came out at about the same time as Stir of Echoes, starring Kevin Bacon as a character who could also communicate with the dead. So, my point is, the idea of a human, whether it be a kid or an adult, making contact with the dead ain't exactly like the discovery of Dark Matter (whatever the fuck that is). However, here is what made The Sixth Sense so good: the execution of the movie. Shyamalan took a simple premise and made a chilling, suspenseful movie around it. The characters weren't terribly memorable, but that was okay - we got to know the characters enough that the story was still largely entertaining. It also helps that there aren't that many characters to begin with beyond Haley Joel Osmond, Bruce Willis, and Toni Collette. Even if I can't remember the characters, the movie was strong enough that I certainly remember several amazing scene. One scene that still haunts me out to this day is when Cole is locked into an old "dungeon" with a hostile ghost by bullies.
Of course, most people cite the ending of The Sixth Sense as one of the best twists in cinematic history. I must admit, it certainly blew me away. Shyamalan did a fine job of misdirecting the audience enough so that one never really suspected anything was wrong with Willis' character, besides there being an uncomfortable emotional distance between he and his wife. It's a good twist, most importantly, because it doesn't feel contrived or cheap. The movie didn't set out to trick you so that it could shove you face in it later - all the signs were there, especially the big hint, specifically, the scene where Cole tells Dr. Crowe he can see dead people, and breath vapor comes out of his mouth as he says it, which the movie establishes is a tell-tale sign that a ghost is present. It's a fine twist, and serves to wrap up Cole's story in that it displays how his gift is not such a curse after all. The theme of an individual living up to his potential instead of being ashamed or afraid of it is something that is explored in Unbreakable, and most of Shyamalan's other work (though not quite as effectively). So, while the movie does a fantastic job of being scary, as I'm sure coping with such an ability as Cole's would be, it ends with an uplifting note: Cole seems to be more comfortable with his ability, and Dr. Crowe can finally "move on" from the past that has kept him unwittingly bound to this world. Everyone wins!
The story was great, but I remember being even more impressed with the cinematography and the use of color. Most of the color in the movie is very muted and drab. However, whenever a ghost is present, the color red is used to almost signify this. In the above scene, when Cole ventures upstairs and hears the angry ghost in the cupboard, he follows a red balloon. Most of the objects that Dr. Crowe interacts with are red (such as the door knob, and his wife's blanket). After Cole finally learns to accept his ability and use it to help people, the color tone of the movie seems to brighten a little.
As for the cinematography, Shyamalan proves himself to be extremely adventurous with a camera, but doesn't self-indulge too much. Most of the shots are fairly stationary, until a ghost is present, and then the camera begins to move more, or the scene is shot from an unsettling angle. Every shot fits each scene perfectly and effectively captures the emotional atmosphere, whether it be scary or happy.
Last, but not least, the acting is really good, if a little subdued at times (a problem that will creep into most of Shyamalan's later work). M. Night seems to prefer his actors to go for a more natural approach to their roles, which can be a double-edged sword, because while the performances may come across as more realistic, they can also just as easily be translated as dull or lifeless. When you have characters who are dealing with larger-than-life situations, such as communicating with the dead, realize that they are a superhero, or dealing with the first wave of an alien invasion, then subdued, "realistic" performances may not be the best approach. However, it works really well for this movie, and Shyamalan was lucky to be working with actors who can do subdued really well.
Now, some cinesnobs will turn their nose up, rolls their eyes, and say that The Sixth Sense is just commercial garbage that is no better than Shyamalan's other work, and while they may be correct that it's "commercial", that is not in and of itself indict a movie to being "terrible". I've seen plenty of commercial movies that are some of the best films ever made (cough, Back to the Future, cough cough). So what if it appeals to the masses - that's what a fucking movie is supposed to do. Movies they are made for just one person to enjoy are called porn. Also, it's just plain delusional to place this movie in the same echelon as Shyamalan's later work. Face it cinesnobs - The Sixth Sense is a great movie. It may not meet the art house standards of:
Have an unbearably slow, plodding pace and be boring
Have a soundtrack that includes laconic, moody music by an obscure, Indy folk band OR music that is obnoxiously upbeat by an obscure Indy folk band.
Show unbridled contempt for the audience
...but it meets the Classic Hollywood Cinema standards of having a solid 3-act story that features characters who complete an arc by the climax of the film, and is filmed and edited in a way so that we know just what the hell is going on. It's an incredibly impressive debut for an amateur aspiring auteur that had audiences frothing at the mouth for his next film, Unbreakable.
