What a Twist!

Rating: 4/10 (14 May 2015)

There are different opinions of when was Shyamalan's turning point was in going from being called "The Next Spielberg" to his name being associated with bad movies and ridiculous twists. Some think it begun with Unbreakable and others his later films like the Village or the Happening. Personally, I've always thought it begun with Signs. Whilst it was received OK at the time, I've always seen it as a mess of a film with dull characters, mostly bland visuals and quite possibly one of the worst twist endings ever put to film.
Just like any Shyamalan film the cast seems to suffer from extreme boredom. I say this because from the very start of the film they all seem completely detached from everything that's going on. For example early on when the family dog attacks the children, Mel Gibson's character just seems mildly distracted when he senses something up. Then the kids themselves don't act like they've been attacked but instead like they've just been mildly irritated by something. Ultimately it's a big problem for any drama, because if the characters don't seem to care then why the hell should the audience?
It's not the actors fault as for some reason Shyamalan has repeated the same dull monotone style for all his actors ever since the Sixth Sense. The problem being that whilst in the Sixth Sense it was something different to what we'd seen before and worked to create the off- putting atmosphere, here it's boring and makes little sense when it's used in casual conversations.
One of the things that bug me the most about Shyamalan's films is that he does tend to put some good ideas and concepts into his films, only to then ruin them. For example there's the aliens themselves. At first they are quite well done with Shyamalan making us fear what we don't see as we are put in the protagonists perspectives seeing only brief glimpses of the invaders. But then he screws it up because when the aliens are revealed they are completely unintimidating and created using incredibly ugly and unrealistic CGI. On top of that the way he has people react at first is interesting with people being very sceptical of whether aliens have invaded. However whilst this could be an interesting background for the story to take place in, it's forced into the foreground and focused on for a significant portion of the film meaning it gets dull pretty quickly.
Obviously just like any Shyamalan film this one has a twist. But this film has not just one, but two of the most laughably implausible twists ever put to film. Firstly it's revealed that the invading aliens are allergic to water. Really? These aliens travel all this way across the galaxy and can be defeated by water? I'm assuming that Shyamalan was trying to go for something like what was done in War of the Worlds where the germs are the downfall, but it worked for that because the Martians had no concept of germs and never would have thought of looking for them. Water on the other hand covers most of the earth! Did the aliens never notice this when they were scouting the planet? These aliens were as dumb as the ones from Plan 9 From Outer Space!
But that's nothing compared to the twist that god killed Mel Gibson's wife so he would know to tell his brother to hit the alien with the baseball bat. There are so many things wrong with this.... Firstly these are the weakest alien invaders ever. A single baseball team on a rainy day and their invasion is over. Secondly, if god really wanted to send a message then why did he have to kill his wife? That sounds more like the way the devil would send a message! And finally did they really have to be told to use the baseball bat against the alien? Honestly I would have thought it would be obvious! For me this is quite possibly one of the worst twists put in a big box office film just for its complete lack of any logic or sense. It's actually laughable that this story made it into a 75 million dollar film.
But that's just what this film is. Hilariously awful. Honestly it was worth watching because it is one of those films that is so bad it's good. I'm rating it low because it fails at the drama and horror that it was attempting. But looking at it in the same vein as a film like Plan 9 From Outer Space it is pretty enjoyable.