Ultimately Disappointing

Rating: 5/10 (11 January 2003)

SPOILERS
I recently viewed Signs for the first time on DVD. I was very excited about this film after viewing the trailers just prior to its release, and the wait for its release to video was long in coming. I have been a great fan of hard core science fiction since I was a teenager, and I have always been fascinated with the possibility that we may not be alone in the universe. Films such as War of the Worlds, Earth vs the Flying Saucers and Close Encounters of the Third Kind were all awesome in their own right and for their time. Although I found a lot to like, I must say I found Signs ultimately disappointing.
Shyamalan has proven himself to be a moviemaker of the highest caliber having directed the brilliant Sixth Sense. In Signs, his talent again comes through in his ability to grip the audience with rising tension. I found myself in the movies grip, anxiously awaiting the payoff. How was the Hess family, and Gibson's character's loss of faith going to play out? I cared about the Hess family and their predicament. Imagining myself in the Hess' place at the moment of seeing the alien figure on top of the roof of the neighboring building left me squirming in my seat. The movies pacing is fine, the acting adaquete, but the climax left me feeling I had been cheated.
Perhaps it is my love of hard core sci-fi that was the root cause of my opinion that this movie failed in the end. The aliens were just too easy to defeat. How is it that a race of beings with the technology to cross the void of space could so easily be tossed aside by just sprinkling a little H2O on them? How would any self respecting alien super race have individuals that cannot find a way to get out of a closet, or break through a basement door? Give me a break.
The problem with this movie, and so many more Hollywood sci-fi flicks is that the writer or writers just lack the imagination and the general knowledge of science to really blow true sci-fi afficionados away. It is in that regard that a movie like the Matrix was so brilliant. Someone with some real imagination sat down and penned a screenplay that truly stretched the imagination of filmgoers and hard core sci-fi buffs in that one. In Signs, the aliens are laughable in their ineptitude. I did not see how having faith had much to do with the alien races demise. This was an alien race of idiots.
Signs has already greatly appealed to the general film viewing public. It will also appeal to the fans of horror/suspense in that the movie will grip you with tension. It will most likely be disappointing to many hard core sci-fi viewers like me that would like to see a little more thought put into the powers of aliens, and how they are defeated. Is it truly that filmakers lack the necessary imagination to produce high quality sci-fi, or is it that they just do not care enough?