Mixed reaction for a film that is too good in some parts, and too bad in others

Rating: Null/10 (3 August 2002)

Signs is a difficult film to look at as one single film. It is, essentially, broken into three various parts. Let's say that these three parts are the technicals, the performance and the plot.
TECHNICALLY: The film is visually outstanding. The use of harsh shadows (i.e. faces cut in half by light, long shadows at night and muted colors at day) makes the film seem even more drastic and terrifying. This visual enhancement is a supplement to the plot as will be discussed later. The films use of special effects is almost inevident, yet it is there. Notice two major shots that seem to pan around an area that can't possibly exist. The first is a shot that pans around a night-time cornfield lit only by a flashlight, finding it's way 360 degrees back to Mel Gibson, and consider another shot that begins looking down over a yard, but seems to then move back through a broken window and into a house that over time is changing seasons from summer to a snowy winter, where we end on a bathroom door as a character then performs his actions. The other major technical note has to do with the sound design which was the most evident of the technical brilliance. Good sound design makes this films level of terror heighten by a factor of 1000. Every creaking footstep, every corn stalk that moves, every gust of wind, and even a complimentary scene of pure darkness give the sound crew some major work to do and they do it well. The attention to minor details was incredible like the pictures on the walls of the house or the little story tidbits that we hardly realize because in real life we experience them and just expect them to be there, and because they are there we find it easier to relate to and understand the world the characters live in.
PERFORMANCE-WISE Strong performances from actors who are trying so hard to give meaning to everything they say and do without giving away meaning to things that will happen... I want to make note of Mel Gibson, whose performance was seemingly good, but it seems that at times he lost sight of the fact he is no longer a reverend, mainly because the script did not call for dialogue to support the concept at the moment. Joaquin Phoenix is always a joy to watch and he is consistent as the slow-witter younger brother. Children give strong performances as well while being given the simplicity of having a media induced terror fantasy to run from.
**SOME MINOR BUT IRRELEVANT SPOILERS**
PLOT: The major lack of the film was the plot. The idea of having the viewpoint of the story be centralized on the family was intelligent, but the small scale of the viewpoint should not have included such a large scale issue like the actual interaction with an alien. Also, with his almost reputation for doing the following two things I wonder if they were really necessary: 1) Shyamalan's cameo was important character work, but a scene involving Shyamalan's kitchen pantry is useless as it has no relevant meaning to us later in the story (it seemed used as a way to plug in the past to the present not as something to supplement what is going on), 2) the use of flashbacks... originally his flashbacks were short and sweet, but they got longer, and longer, and longer, and eventually they became arduous, we don't need a smack in the face, the pace of the film is so slow that we have the time to interpret and understand. Also, I am bugged by the aliens. Why did they have to be hostile, why did we ever have to see them. Seeing them defeats the purpose that we are afraid of the wind, or the shadows that turn out to be birds perched in odd positions, or the creaking footsteps or the dark corners. And really, did they have to be hostile, I felt almost as if the Hess' desire to understand made things seem scary enough without the aliens actually being hostile. I know if I was an alien I'd want to know what I can instead of just poisoning the world to death. As for seeing the aliens- the alien we see in a birthday party video looks like a man wearing a tight Hulk costume that you can buy at Walgreens, while the alien at the end looks like an incomplete render of a concept for an alien CGI figure (I figure that the video alien was green because it was to later be replaced with a CGI alien).
The films form was outstanding and it is a film I will watch again just to marvel at it's sound design and visuals, but it bothered me that the film took a lot of cop-out tactics to find it's ending as opposed to giving us what we really wanted, an enormous shock (what is things really were an elaborate hoax, that would have been more satisfying yet would've made the story considerably different).