An M. Night Shyamalan Apologist No More

Rating: 5/10 (16 June 2008)

I have been an M. Night Shyamalan apologist for a while now. Everyone loved "The Sixth Sense." Most people loved "Unbreakable." Then it starts to slip. I loved "Signs" and really loved "The Village" (that one's theme of "the good old days" hit close to home for me), but some didn't. I didn't like "Lady and in the Water," but my wife did. I figured it just wasn't my cup of tea (the whole fairy tale thing), and I thought Night had too big a part (he's not a terribly good actor). But it had a good concept and some quality actors and some very good performances so there was some forgiveness from me. With this movie, I am no longer coming to his defense. OK. I know he doesn't need me to, but I'm looking for much better from him next time out.
I was a little generous and gave this title a 5 out of 10 because the first half of the movie was actually pretty good! The first 30-45 minutes were tense and kept me on edge as any good suspense movie should. It built in some questions as to what was causing the "happening," and caused me to jump in my seat a few times. There were some okay performances from Wahlberg and Deschanel and a couple of great performances from Leguizamo and Buckley (she reminded me of Kathy Bates in Misery a little with her out-of-touch intensity). I was also very impressed by the performance from Jeremy Strong as Private Auster, and Spencer Breslin caused a disagreement between myself and my wife--it was hard to recognize him since he grew up some and did not overact as usual! But the second half of the movie just fizzled. There were very few tense moments since we knew what was coming every time the wind blew and someone stared into space and took 2 steps backwards. And the explanation for the cause came too early in the film so the questioning pretty much ended. There was no real climax in the story. Two people standing in a wind-blown field is not very exciting (and their romance was even more boring). It would have been acceptable for the pre-attack warning to be wind-blown grass for a low budget, independent film, but Night used ILM for his special effects. ILM!! And wind blowing through the trees was the best they could do? Then in the end it was just a long, "green" environmentalist guilt trip. Now, maybe my right-leaning political viewpoint taints my feelings a little, but who wants to sit in a movie theater and be guilt-ed by a suspenseful thriller--especially when there was very little suspense or thrill? (By the way, it takes a lot of electrical energy, fuel, and petroleum-based film to make a movie, but that's an entry for a different type of website.) And the worst thing? I sometimes use my watch to time the actual running time (without credits) of a film. It felt like hours and it was only 86 minutes! Unbelievable from Night--I'm usually riveted throughout any of his movies.
Night, you're my boy, but you really missed bad with this one!