Put me down as another who adores Unbreakable. I found The Sixth Sense enjoyable but nothing I’d be likely to watch again, and all the rest of Night’s oeuvre is just… bleeach.
I recall from an interview (possibly a special feature on the dvd) that Unbreakable was originally going to follow a more typical superhero arc, in which everyman finds out he has powers, then uses powers to take down the big badguy, but Shyamalan found the first half of that formula much more interesting than the second (oh dear, am I over simplifying something that’s actually three act? eh, whatever) and essentially said “Screw it, I’ll make the movie just about him finding out he’s a hero.” But even as only part of a familiar story, it was just a retelling of that familiar story.
And that was a good thing.
Shyamalan is weak with both plot itself and at conveying a plot, and good at atmosphere and humanizing details. Working within the confines of “super hero origin” (and also when he was working with “ghost story”) his strengths were able to shine and the audience had no problem enjoying a take on a simple story they’d already heard countless times.
But when he tries to deal with plots that are even the tiniest bit more complex (or are trying to be), the story ends up presented in a way that’s dull to follow. And a bored audience will catch lapses in logic that an entertained one will happily accept as part of the ride.
Cameron is very much the opposite: fantastic at plot and pacing, but occasionally without offering much else. Which is a heck of a lot more fun.
I have to disagree. I wasn’t at all bored during Signs or The Village, and it wasn’t trying to think of something to keep my mind at work that made me ralize the movie’s superficialities and illogic that ultimately made me hate the film. That’s not at all my experience, or that of anyone else I’ve talked to. The illogical parts leap out at you unbidden – they don’t need a bored mind to take root. And i wasn’t bored, in any case. Shyamalan’s flicks jst have manifest problems with plotting and details, and the twist, the payoff, which is inextricably part of the plot, is maddeningly stupid. That’s the problem.
James Cameron was the worst writer in Hollywood until Shyamalan came along. (Although at least Cameron has a certain genius for action and suspense structure.)
OK, I hyperboled. I just thought *Titanic *was such an extraordinarily painful cringefest, and all the worst things about it were the writing. For me it was “two hours and 74 minutes” of getting punched in the gut, over and over and over, by James “I’m Writing As Bad As I Can” Cameron’s dialog. I had to go see it a second time, just to pay attention to the visuals. Of which, of course, it’s a nearly unparalleled masterpiece. So overall, yeah, his peerless skill at devising action scenarios balances out his worst dialog ever in the history of words.
Shyamalan has a very real talent for putting certain kinds of imagery up on the screen, but his *overall *writing is so terrible that the balance is waaaaaay in the negative.
“Bored” may not be quite the right way of having phrased it, but in my personal experience, a really fun or gripping movie can throw something even stupider then “let’s go to the planet made of the only thing that’s poison to us without space suits” and I won’t think twice until after the movie, 'cause I’ll be too busy enjoying the ride. (I think Tv Tropes calls that one “fridge logic”.) Heck, I can imagine the setting of The Village making for a fine fairy tale-- but when the story is presented in his disjointed “isn’t this complex and deeeeeeeeeep and spooooooooooooky” way, my mind goes “no, just dumb.”
So not “noticing continuity errors because I’ve nothing else to think of” bored, but “not entertained enough to accept the hokey parts” bored.
(I’ve seen Signs two or three times, and each time I was simultaneously sucked in by the aspects done well and baffled as to why I was watching. It has to get good any minute-- and yet I know it won’t.)
I see your other post where you explain in more depth, but I’m still not exactly sure what this means.
Is this the average Hollywood script you’re talking about? You make an exception for Kevin Smith screenplays, but it’s not just his plot structure that’s poor, it’s his overall cinematography. Chasing Amy is one of my favorite movies, but there are some whole scenes, like the conversation at the dartboard, for which the term “visually uninspired” is the kindest possible description. They even make jokes about this in the commentary. But the dialogue is so strong, the characterization so convincing, that nothing else really matters. So how uncommon are these Kevin-Smith-like exceptions?
And if dialogue is only 2% of a screenplay, then how important is the completed (actor approved) dialogue to the finished movie? I wouldn’t personally view it as anything approaching a majority of importance, but it can’t just be 2%. Bad dialogue won’t kill an otherwise powerful performance, but it will muck things up at least a little bit more than that.
I think what Cervaise is saying is that Screenwriting is creating everything. You have to create a plot, describe the setting, set up the scenes which support the plot within that setting, create the characters, find ways to show who and what the characters are, then figure out whether or not this is going to be something watchable. Then, and only then, is dialogue really critical. It’s definitely in there, but it’s actually a relatively small item in the grand scheme of things. Cervaise is saying that Screenwriting is Directing before the cameras start rolling. Not only do you have to do all the above, but you have to find ways to explain it so that any idiot who reads the screenplay can understand it. And you have the full knowledge that the director is going to come along and likely screw things up, or totally change it, or toss in some ham-handed “social commentary” to push their pet cause, or sign an actor who is grossly wrong for the role.
Now, acting is very important there, but acting is a lot more than just dialogue. The screenplay has to get across what that character is and ideally guide the actor in figuring out everything from mannerisms to attitude. Dialogue is really the second layer of communication.
This about Star Wars: A New Hope. If you watched the movie with the dialogue removed, it would still be pretty darn comprehensible. If you just heard the full audio track, you could follow along and maybe enjoy it. Try listening to just to dialogue, though: it’d mean nothing at all.
Anyhoo, while watching Unbreakable I kinda felt like the guy who tried to a buy a comic book of Samuel L. and then got kicked out because he wasn’t fully appreciating the wondrous depths of the subtle counterpoint of the underlying metaphor or something. I know I’m supposed to reverently shocked into tears and silence and emotionally moved on some profound level, but really I just wanted a good time. That movie works better if you take Bruce Willis (or at least his character’s abilities) out, actually, and just make it about Samuel’s obsession with a comic-book existence where people don’t have to live in constant pain and justice is invariably served.
One of these days I’m going to find a fellow M. Night fan.
I like they way he tries to make you think of the underlying meaning of his stories. I also find it refreshing to NOT know how a movie is going to end an hour before hand.
I think the man is an intellectual and greatly misunderstood.
Really? I knew how The Sixth Sense would end about 15 minutes into it. It was a movie about a kid who could see ghosts. The Very Big Actor gets shot at point blank range. Big Actor=Dead Early=Ghost. I don’t understand why this was some shocking revelation to people. I don’t know how it could have been more obvious–maybe if M. Night had included a big flashing neon sign?