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First thing first - I am on top of the cult following Shyamalan has.
Having said that, my worst fears came true last evening. Shyamalan has taken this cult following too seriously, much like his earlier success. The fact is that fan loyalty is as good as the idol and we have seen this slip for many idols before Shyamalan.
Yes, it would be early to write him off but not too early for him to see SIGNS for the Beginning of the end. In fact, some would argue that the rot started with the Village and sadly I don’t have strong evidence to counter that.
The good thing first - like his last two duds, this film too has the heart in the right place but lets face it - cinema halls are no church. If we want to redeem ourselves then its unlikely we will walk into a multiplex to cleanse our souls.
But I would have been okay if THE HAPPENING did even that. But it didn’t and now we are left with one of the best new hopes of cinema left with a huge gap to redeem himself.
The thing is that it fails on so many levels that its embarrassing to point such trivial things for a movie directed by someone set to wear the crown as the Hitchcockian master.
So, let me just rattle the miseries off - single dimensional characters, lack of any conflict, bad performances, weakest screenplay and uninspired direction. He couldn’t even make nature look menacing, something that even a non intellectual mainstream pot boiler called THE DAY AFTER TOMMOROW managed to achieve. It’s all there and more...
The thing about making realistic cinema is that you cant really be realistic, you just have to pretend to be realistic but never forget that you are actually making a dramatic art form called cinema that needs heightened emotions and chills and thrills and fireworks even if the film is a bloody biography of mother Teresa.
Then this subject was in any case far more exciting - global warming or nature strikes back could be made into a menacing and thrilling movie. Yes, agreed when it really happens it will probably be slow and understated the way Shyamalan has shown it but this is cinema....you should be able to wake me up before I smell the coffee!!!
The film should have been called THE WAITING because that’s all the audience kept doing for something...anything to "happen".
I seriously suggest that Shyamalan takes some time off and de-school himself from his success story and starts making movies from the heart.
And one last suggestion - PLEASE STAY AWAY FROM BOLLYWOOD!!! That’s the last place you will find any answers for sure...because we are still looking for them ourselves.....
Amit
[email protected]
Having said that, my worst fears came true last evening. Shyamalan has taken this cult following too seriously, much like his earlier success. The fact is that fan loyalty is as good as the idol and we have seen this slip for many idols before Shyamalan.
Yes, it would be early to write him off but not too early for him to see SIGNS for the Beginning of the end. In fact, some would argue that the rot started with the Village and sadly I don’t have strong evidence to counter that.
The good thing first - like his last two duds, this film too has the heart in the right place but lets face it - cinema halls are no church. If we want to redeem ourselves then its unlikely we will walk into a multiplex to cleanse our souls.
But I would have been okay if THE HAPPENING did even that. But it didn’t and now we are left with one of the best new hopes of cinema left with a huge gap to redeem himself.
The thing is that it fails on so many levels that its embarrassing to point such trivial things for a movie directed by someone set to wear the crown as the Hitchcockian master.
So, let me just rattle the miseries off - single dimensional characters, lack of any conflict, bad performances, weakest screenplay and uninspired direction. He couldn’t even make nature look menacing, something that even a non intellectual mainstream pot boiler called THE DAY AFTER TOMMOROW managed to achieve. It’s all there and more...
The thing about making realistic cinema is that you cant really be realistic, you just have to pretend to be realistic but never forget that you are actually making a dramatic art form called cinema that needs heightened emotions and chills and thrills and fireworks even if the film is a bloody biography of mother Teresa.
Then this subject was in any case far more exciting - global warming or nature strikes back could be made into a menacing and thrilling movie. Yes, agreed when it really happens it will probably be slow and understated the way Shyamalan has shown it but this is cinema....you should be able to wake me up before I smell the coffee!!!
The film should have been called THE WAITING because that’s all the audience kept doing for something...anything to "happen".
I seriously suggest that Shyamalan takes some time off and de-school himself from his success story and starts making movies from the heart.
And one last suggestion - PLEASE STAY AWAY FROM BOLLYWOOD!!! That’s the last place you will find any answers for sure...because we are still looking for them ourselves.....
Amit
[email protected]