A story of a man finally living up to his own potential

Rating: 10/10 (24 November 2000)

You know you have seen a great movie if you can interpret the story on more than one level (regardless of whether or not the writer/director intended to include a sub-text).
You can see David Dunn as a man who gives up on his dream as a young man because it will require risk taking and this scares him. The "safe route", however, causes more damage to his life. The story finds him deeply depressed, withdrawn, and in danger of losing the two most important people in his life as a result. His wife complains that he is not the man she fell in love with; and he even shrinks from his son's natural admiration, ashamed because he knows he is unworthy.
Having reached the bottom of the barrel and shaken by a brush with death, he is forced to re-examine his life, find and finally embrace his unique gift. As with the rest of us, he realizes that he had several opportunities in the past to follow his unique destiny, but was too afraid or lazy to actualize his potential.
We truly live in a "time without heroes", as observed by Elijah. Most of us choose to sit in front of the TV, keep our boring "soul sucking" jobs, keep our loved ones at a distance and try to fill the holes in our lives by buying stuff we don't need.
When we have moments of inspiration, we quickly stick a pin in them, and convince ourselves that we would likely fail. Mostly we are scared of how others would judge us.
We choose the inertia of the ordinary rather than take risks to discover the extra-ordinary potential we all possess.
Unbreakable, one one level, is about this fundamental truth about human nature and the modern age.