I am so Disappointed in M. Night Shyamalan!

Rating: 1/10 (20 June 2008)

Can this really be the work of such an accomplished director who gave us such acclaimed works as 'The Sixth Sense' and 'Unbreakable'? 'The Village' is wrongly considered by many critics as Shyamalan's weakest film, but this takes weak to a whole new level: The plot (I use the term loosely) depicts a teacher and his girlfriend's fight for survival against a natural epidemic that forces people to kill themselves. The entire North East of America is infected for a day, and then... it ends.
What is even worse than the lacklustre plot is the acting - this is the first film i've seen in a long time when I literally burst out laughing during, what I believe was supposed to be a really intense scene due to horrendously bad acting. The leading man (I forget his name and, to be honest never want to hear it again) has a hard time figuring out if his character is there to increase drama or create comic relief. This obviously stems from the script which lead me to believe that Shyamalan had no idea if he wanted to make a comedy or a horror. If he was aiming for a mixture of the two it certainly isn't working - the humour is very out of place.
I went into the cinema expecting a GREAT movie - what else would I expect from one of my favourite directors - but I came out having seen, what I can only fairly describe this film as a stupid movie.
This mess is a complete contrast of everything that Shyamalan stands for. It beheld nothing that distinctly says 'Shyamalan' to me - the atmosphere of 'The Village' was sorely missing from this picture.
My best advice to M. Night Shyamalan is to burn this film and forget it ever happened - the latter I will certainly be doing.