You have to drop the Gibson/Phoenix/Shyamalan baggage

Rating: 7/10 (3 May 2011)

It's hard to write a review of this movie now (2011), after all the attention that Mel Gibson's ugly tirades got, after Joaquin Phoenix's crazy "mockumentary", after M. Night Shyamalan's missing the mark with "Lady in the Water," "The Happening," and "The Last Airbender." But if you can let go of the baggage that subsequent events have loaded onto this movie, it's a decent, watchable movie. It does have some flaws, but it's well above average as entertainment and gets points for originality from all parties.
So: what's it about? It takes a little while to declare itself. Initially it seems to want to be a suspense drama. And then it morphs into a sci-fi invasion drama. And then, at the end, it finally declares itself: it's about unlikely events providing a redemption for a man of faith who, for a while, lost his faith.
First things first: Gibson. Up until we were inundated with recordings of his ugly tirades of venom spewed at his ex-girlfriend, and his anti-semitic tirade during his DUI arrest, Gibson was a genuinely likable actor who could project a streak of craziness that made him suspenseful to watch. There was also a sense of humor about him; at any moment in a serious drama, he might break out with a comedic moment that lightened things up. And he conveys these things in the character he plays here, but he also gets across to us that this character is a man who has lost his calling and doesn't know how to fill the empty place it left.
Working with him to move the plot forward is Joaquin Phoenix as his younger brother, a man who hasn't lost anything of a calling because he hasn't found anything to hold him yet. He exists in this movie mostly as a foil for Gibson's character, and he plays that part well. He's an actor who is sexy and charismatic and has a feel of dangerousness even when you know he's solidly on the side of good things.
Through a series of events surrounding an alien invasion, Gibson takes actions to protect his two kids, Morgan (Rory Culkin) and Bo (an adorable, and tiny, Abigail Breslin). As events proceed, we get flashbacks that lead us to the source of Gibson's disillusionment and loss of faith, the death of his wife in a freak car accident.
This leads me somewhat obliquely to what I have to regard as this movie's biggest flaw: Shyamalan doesn't seem to have much faith in the ability of his audience to see what he's getting at. He is not subtle in getting his major premise across; he wants to spell it out, then repeat it for emphasis, and then finally beat us over the head with it to make sure that we "get it." This is jarring, to say the least, and it works against the movie: it's hard not to feel that maybe if he feels the need to be obvious, BLATANTLY obvious, perhaps he's unsure of himself and his craft as a writer and a director. He doesn't want the material to fail: but I think that if he wants to craft movies that are more than workmanlike entertainment, he has to take chances in trusting the audience and trusting himself and his ability to get things across to the audience without spelling them out so obviously.
He doesn't want to take that chance, and that shows. And it hurts the movie.
I kind of think that it affected Gibson and Phoenix, too. There are some moments in the film when it seems like they're just going through the motions, just "reading" their lines, not living them and making them live. Gibson does this more than Phoenix does, and it makes me wonder: was Shyamalan afraid to call him on this and demand better from him? It's obvious to the whole world now that Gibson has quite an ego, and with his experience both in front of and behind the camera, he must be an intimidating presence to direct. Was he holding back and just going through the motions because he didn't like some of the material? Was Shyamalan unaware of how Gibson came across, or was he afraid to demand better? I don't know and it doesn't matter. Those moments when Gibson is obviously not engaged in the material are jarring.
In the end, I want to recommend this film with some reservations. It's decent entertainment and has originality. It also has flaws that hold it back.
But I think the bottom line in deciding whether you want to watch this film or not is whether you can disengage what you know about Gibson, Phoenix and Shymalan off the set from what's happening on the screen. If you bring their baggage to this movie, I don't think you will enjoy it at all.