CriticSociety- film reviews

 Groucho wrote at 9/25/2002 1:06:49 PM:

I like this film. It's an OK thriller with very good performances. However, what I felt in 'Unbreakable' I felt here even more: the suspense of 'The Sixth Sense', which in that movie was natural, is attempted here, but not only it doesn't reach its power, but it even feels forced. Slow scenes and unseen action, which usually are a couple of the best elements for real horror, don't work as well here. My problem is probably the fact that I didn't really swallow the story...

SPOILERS AHEAD (If you haven't seen the movie, now you know my overall opinion, but if you have, keep reading for details)

I must state before anything else, that I believe in extra-terrestrials. As a matter of fact, I not only "believe", but no doubt exists in me of their existence. I also believe in the idea that they are watching us, probably all the time, or once in a while, but they are present, around us, and they know about us, and they have followed us for ages. I don't see them as savage creatures who want to destroy us, for advanced civilizations should tend less to barbarism, though they might have good reasons for wanting to conquer the Earth or its people. All right, let's believe in the idea that some extra-terrestrials are aggressive, or want for some reason to conquer the Earth...

I prefer to see the tale of how little people like me or anyone deal with this kind of situation, than the way the Governments deal with it. I don't care if there is a "War of the worlds" because that would be really hard to believe. If there is a story like this, it's best if treated the way this one is: Not much information is shown to us but only how a family deals with the situation.

However, the fact that this family is really weird, in the way that the kids behave strangely (especially the girl) and dark shadows from the past haunt everybody, makes the story a little confusing. Then, unexplainable scenes add to the suspense but then don't add much to the finale and suspense falls down. The orchestrated finale where different things add up to a final resolution that helps the family get out of trouble, is a real disappointment. No need to realize that there are no coincidences and that everything means something, to take the decision of attacking the alien with a baseball bat. Plus: the glasses of water around the house, were meant for that purpose? OK, suppose the girl really had problems with water and left glasses all around, but how many glasses are there in a house? Not as many as shown if the family has only four members, I think. And what's the idea anyway? Is this a "The Wizard of Oz" homage or why are the aliens hurt by water? I don't see a need to show them to us either, especially if not fitting the usual description...

As you can see, I had many problems with this movie. I liked some things though, like the way this guy had lost the faith and gets it back (not enough to please me but at least it was a well-developed purpose for the movie), and many suspenseful scenes that certainly worked. I was scared but not that much, though I did yell a couple of times (more out of shocks than real fear).

So... now you know. Thanks for the review Morris! Now I'm looking forward to Shyamalan's next project, though unfortunately 'The Sixth Sense' was a peak he's getting farther and farther from...

 Morris wrote at 9/25/2002 10:09:48 PM:

What a juicy post man! I wish there were more conversations like these all the time! Of course, only few movies provoke so much turmoil, but it's something I definitely enjoy.

Now, you've all read my review and you all now I definitely disagree with most of what Groucho thought about the pic. But I think it's great how different an opinion we can have on the same movie without neither of us hating it. I like it, and here are my spoiler-filled comments:

First of all, I do think the movie is extremelly suspenseful. I am aware that this is something each human being feels differently, but the fact that we never know anything until the last half hour and how this common family starts behaving under unknown circumstances felt very interesting and real to me. It was tense and it was horrific. Then put in all the "shock" scares there are and you've definitely got a highly effective suspenseful movie. The audience I saw the movie with were certainly hypnotized and terrified. You could feel it.

There's also something we got very differently, and that's the movie's finale. Surprisingly enough, I never thought about coincidences and about the movie making a statement as to how things are meant to be and that there's no coincidences in life. I mean, what Mel's wife told him certainly helped them to get away of THAT situation, but life is long and it was just a one-time thing. Of course, things like this don't happen, but either you buy it or you don't. So what did I think of the ending? Well, that the whole movie was about having faith. You don't have to believe in destiny, you don't have to be a very religious person, you don't have to believe in luck, but faith, you just gotta have faith in life, faith in yourself, faith in others, faith in things. At the end Mel's faith returns, and it isn't because of anything necessarily God-related as you might expect.

About the amount of glasses in the house... I'll give you that one. Perhaps they were too much, but on the other hand when you buy glasses you buy a whole bunch of the same ones. And perhaps they had two or three different sets. Who knows?

Now, I think the most debateable of your comments was the "why are aliens hurt by water?" thing. Well, why not? We have no idea how aliens behave, right? So Shyamalan could do with the notion whatever he wanted. And it served his story pretty well and I liked how it worked for the movie. It's exactly like he did with "The Sixth Sense", which I LOVE but you love even more. I always thought his "ghosts can only be seen when they want to" (or something like that) thing kind of conventional. In that movie that very simple excuse was the explanation for a lot of contrived and inconsequential scenes. I think that in "Signs" he did it again, but actually put it to a better use, because he only used it for the ending and it wasn't such big a deal. Perhaps it was also a homage to "The Wizard of Oz" or whatever, but I don't really see how we can argue about this, lol, since, well, we know absolutely nothing about aliens.

About showing us an alien as it is... I also had mixed feelings about it at first, but then realized that it was kind of necessary for the finale. He need to carry young Rory and "contaminate" him. He also needed to be punched by Joaquin. It would've feel kind of awkward not to see the alien in this scenes. I agree that less is better... and actually the whole movie is about that, but it did feel necessary at the end. The approach they took to design the alien was ok, I mean, they didn't do anything quite controversial or different, and it was always shown with very dim light.

Finally, hehe, I'd like to point that, for ME and only me, Shyamalan has gotten better with each movie. "The Sixth Sense" was good, "Unbreakable" was great and "Signs" was unbelievable!

 Groucho wrote at 9/25/2002 11:20:17 PM:

Moe,

You're right, it's funny how you've liked Shyamalan's films (from 'The Sixth Sense' on) more and more while I have liked them less and less...

As for your comments, I see you mostly pointed out how most things I didn't like can be liked by someone else, out of taste or personal appreciation. I suppose I was a little harsh about the 'Wizard of Oz' comment but by that time (during my watching of the movie) I was already kinda pissed and that only made it worse. You're right, they might be hurt by water, and you're right, we know nothing about it, but for me, that was one more element to make the climax quite dull, you know? You compare it to the ghosts seeing only what they wanted to, from 'The Sixth Sense', but that was a constant during the whole film, made sense for all ghosts acting like they did, and certainly made sense for the finale (made A LOT of sense and was the key element for the plot twist). The difference I see is that in 'Signs', the water thing is not a constant of importance throughout the movie (I mean, they do mention it and stuff, but the story doesn't change much because of it), but in the end is one of the most important things, while the girl had coincidentally (or not) left glasses filled with water all around the house. This time, I wasn't like "Oh of course! The water!" but like "Oh, come on..."

As for the audience around you, I'm still amazed at how the reactions in your town and mine usually differ. I suppose that's because people in this town are colder and don't show as much their emotions. However, they were not as terrified as with, let's say, 'The Others' (to mention a recent example). All the people screamed when the dog barked, and when the alien grabbed Rory, but none were as tense as I supposed they would. Most people (including the two people I was with) reacted mostly the way I did.

Well, I guess there's not much more to say here. I would've loved to love it, but I still have faith in Shyamalan. If faith was what this film was about, and not losing it, or getting it back, I'm happy to say I haven't lost it at all, and I am expecting something better (for my standards) in the future. I'm real glad that this guy keeps making such sophisticated movies about such special subjects... Keep them coming! ;)

 Morris wrote at 10/6/2002 5:32:02 PM:

Well, you're right. There are some things in the movie that for me were great elements and for you were flaws. We both see them with different points of view and that's ok. I'm just glad Shyamalan exists, lol, because he's one of my favorite directors out there.

As for the water thing, well, that's one more thing we don't see eye to eye. What you point out as your defense regarding "The Sixth Sense" for me is a big flaw. Well, not much a flaw than, say, a convenient device Shyamalan used to make sense out of his story. The "ghosts can only be seen when they want to" thing was a recurring theme throughtout the entire movie and I never liked that because it kind of sucked a bit of intelligence from an already good script. At least the water thing in "Signs" happened only at the end, so it wasn't as annoying and it wasn't just a device to get his way from an entire plot.

Anyway, "Signs", I love it!

 Groucho wrote at 10/6/2002 9:03:34 PM:

I think the problem is that you've got it all wrong. It's not "Ghosts can only be seen when they want to" but "Ghosts only see what they want to". It's understood as an unconscious level of the ghost which blinds the concsious level in respect of things that make it clear for themselves that they are not alive. Something like living people not seeing their own problems, or their faults. Ghosts don't choose when they are seen, only choose what they see. From what you said, I think you didn't really get it, or probably didn't want to see it... Just kidding!

...But do think about it, this is not a matter of point of views, but a fact.

 Morris wrote at 10/7/2002 11:24:32 PM:

Indeed, I did get it wrong, but only in my last post. As a matter of fact a couple of posts ago I said I didn't even remember how that thing really worked, and I definitely got it wrong for my last one. Still, I haven't seen "The Sixth Sense" for a while, but fact is when I've seen it I've perfectly understood what it all means. But anyway, all of these doesn't matter because what I meant by "different points of view" was not what Shyamalan wrote and declared as a fact (nothing wrong or arguable about that) but the way that what you see as a flaw in "Signs" I see as a quality in it and viceversa regarding "The Sixth Sense".

Just read an interview with Shyamalan in which he said he's already writing his next movie. God, can't wait to know what it'll be about!!!!!

 Groucho wrote at 10/8/2002 10:23:06 AM:

Please tell me as soon as you hear about it! You'll definitely here it first, and I'll be anxiously waiting for news.