Tag: M. Night Shymalan

M. Night Shymalan “Traps” Us Again with Twist After Twist

On August 4, 2024

In Movies, Pop Culture, Reviews, Scary stories

Night Shymalan is a Writer/Director whose films seem to provoke strong reactions. He always seem to be trying for that “surprise twist” ending that appeared in his break-through iconic film “The Sixth Sense” (1999). In “Trap,” which opened August 2nd, the film has so many twists concluding at 103 minutes that I’d be giving away too much of the plot if I were to list them all. Just when you think “this is the end” there’s yet another twist. Personally, I enjoyed most of that. Other critics did not and savaged the film, but it definitely holds your interest throughout.

PLOT

Josh Hartnett plays a father with a dark side who takes his daughter to a music concert that has been set up to catch him there. How do they know he’s among the 3000 men present in a crowd of 20,642? You’ll find out as the plot progresses. His goal is to escape. But can he?

The premise of a doting father taking his teen-aged daughter to a Taylor Swift-like concert is timely. I could definitely relate to the hysteria of young teen-aged girls at these things. Not only did my daughter work for Ms. Swift and have the task of bringing audience members backstage to meet their idol (the role that M, Night Shymalan has here), but I was present at a Beatles concert in 1965 at the San Francisco Cow Palace, where teen-aged girls with tears streaming down their faces knew every line of every song and screamed themselves senseless.

I remember looking around, each time, and saying to myself, “WTF is going on?” I was beyond the age of hysterical fandom. But I’ve seen it go down, and it is something to behold and to be in the middle of it is an experience. More could have been done with that by the skilled cinematographer.

I have three main things that I would say about this film:

It appears that M. Night Shymalan’s daughter, Saleka Night Shymalan, wants to become a music diva like Taylor Swift. What better way to launch her career than depicting her as one in this film? (she wrote most of the music and performs a lot of it.) After all, it worked for DJT on “The Apprentice” and launched him to the presidency. Saleka even gets to be the heroine of the film when it finally winds down (which doesn’t seem to be happening for Trump right now).
Josh Hartnett is an actor whose talent should have been recognized long ago. However, a less-attractive male lead (Jesse Plemens or Mark Wahlberg, for instance) would have been a better choice to play Cooper. Hartnett is a good actor; he does his best with the script. But we expect our serial killers to be less handsome. We can argue about this, citing Ted Bundy (et. al.)as a serial killer whose appearance was not sinister, and I realize that Hartnett’s good looks did contribute to the success of many of his manipulative moments in “Trap”, but I still think that he comes off as way too “good.” The hidden evil is extremely well -hidden under that good-looking exterior. In “Twisters” (which I recently reviewed) both female leads did credible jobs, but the new (plural) “Twisters” needed the grit of the original “Twister” female lead,Helen Hunt. “Trap” needs less of the matinee idol handsomeness of Hartnett to really convince us he could be “the Butcher.”
The music wasn’t as “catchy” as Ms. Swift’s tunes lyrically, but Saleka Shymalan acquitted herself nobly onstage, aided by Kid Cudi as The Thinker. Great costumes. Okay songs and she can sing and play—definite pluses.

THE CAST

Who knew that Hayley Mills of “The Parent Trap” (1960) was still alive? And why would she be running the show as the FBI profiler who sets the trap to catch the Butcher at a concert by the teenaged songtress of the moment, Lady Raven? Someone suggested that Shymalan simply liked the fact that Hayley Mills was in “The Parent Trap” and that was enough. [Not really.]

Alison Pill portrays Cooper’s wife Rachel, and she is one of those faces that you just know you’ve seen in a million movies. She does a respectable but unremarkable job. She’s known for “The Newsroom” (2012-2014) and “Vice,” and has an extensive resume of work.

More remarkable in his role as Jamie, the Black guy who unwittingly helps Cooper out at the arena, is Jonathan Langdon, who provides a bit of comic relief (along with assistance to the bad guy) He’s so memorable that Shymalan has attached a small post script in the film that shows Jamie’s reaction when he learns that he has been duped by The Butcher.

I’ve seen nearly all of Shymalan’s films: “The Sixth Sense” (1999); “Unbreakable” (2000); “Signs” (2002); “The Village” (2004); “Lady in the Water” (2006); “Split” (2016); “Old”(2021); “A Knock at the Cabin” (2023). That only leaves a couple and some of his television work, so I feel comfortable saying that of the films in this list, the best is the classic “The Sixth Sense.” “Trap” would be included as one of the three best, otherwise, book-ended by “Split”—which benefited greatly from a world class acting performance by James McAvoy—and by “Signs”—which had Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix and Rory Culkin (and don’t forget the tin-foil hats!).

The others I’ve listed left you feeling very disappointed, but I was not disappointed in the acting and tension and twistiness of “Trap.” I was just unconvinced that Josh Hartnett was the right choice for the role.

One player onscreen who WAS the right choice for the role was the young girl playing Riley, Cooper’s Lady Raven-obsessed daughter, Ariel Donoghue. The 14-year-old has appeared in a television series, “Wolf Like Me” (2022-2023) and already has eleven IMDB credits. She’s good, and, in this part, she is excellent. I’ll be watching for her in future roles.

So was Josh Hartnett fine at emoting, but he was just too darned good-looking and charming to convince me that he was bad-to-the-bone. (His cross to bear!) Harnett has said, in interviews, that attending a Taylor Swift concert really helped him to understand the scenario.

THE BAD:

Cinematographer Sayonbha Mukdeeprom (“Challengers”) could have done more with the crowd scenes within what is presented as the Tanaka Arena in Philadelphia. Only it isn’t.

Shymalan always pays tribute to his Philadelphia roots and even had a CGI insertion of a building into Philadelphia’s skyline for “Glass,” but I had a sneaking suspicion that this film, which was shot in Canada, was playing fast and loose with the Tanaka Arena’s real location. In fact, the exterior of the building is actually Canada’s Rogers Centre in Toronto and the exterior is Canada’s First Ontario Centre.

In his desire to have numerous twists, a few are waaay out there, (like the final one in the film.) I also object to the “escape from the limo” plot premise. I’m sure others will contribute their own objections to the many attempts at “twists” that seemed to go on for a good 30 to 45 minutes past what I thought was the finale.

It’s tough to always hit a home run and get a “twist” that satisfies. I salute M. Night Shymalan for continuing to try and for delivering an enjoyable film that holds your interest, despite its shortcomings. I’d predict more singing for M. Night Shymalan’s talented daughter Saleka. Her “Trap”role was a better premiere effort than Ishana Shymalan’s directorial debut with “Watchers,” which had far bigger plot problems than “Trap.”

“Knock At the Cabin:” A Return to Form for M. Night Shymalan

By Connie Wilson

On February 8, 2023

In Movies, Of Local (Quad Cities') Interest, Pop Culture, Reviews

“Knock at the Cabin” is M. Night Shymalan’s return to, if not stardom, at least respectability. Most of the fans who have reviewed the film have liked it. The critics? Not so much.

As a critic, I vote with the people. Cal me more Ebert than Siskel.

I liked it, although—let’s face it, folks—it is going to be very difficult for Shymalan to ever live up to the “twist” of “The Sixth Sense.” He has had 7 films in a row that have opened at Number One at the box office and, as another review said, “He’s the rare brand-name filmmaker who prefers to be a low-budget outsider.” Apparently, Shymalan has been financing his own movies ever since the one about the girl who lived in the swimming pool (Bryce Dallas Howard, Ron’s daughter) with Paul Giamatti self-destructed back in 2006 (“Lady in the Water”). That one was a bit of a stinker, true.

I applaud Shymalan’s realization that, in order to control the final product, he would need “final cut” and one way to get that is by securing your own financing. He seems to be continuing to make films post that swimming pool disaster, so I’m guessing it’s turned out to be personally profitable. Since this one only cost $20 million to make, it should turn a profit, which means more movies from M. Night Shymalan (and more cameo appearances, a la Alfred Hitchcock), as we briefly see him in the infomercial about air fryers on television.

Let’s recap, post his breakthrough and most memorable 1999 film (“The Sixth Sense”), which was the second highest-grossing horror movie of all time.

“Unbreakable” – 2000. Budget – $75 million. Made worldwide: $248 million.

“Signs” – 2002. Budget $72 million. Made worldwide: $408 million.

“The Village” – 2004. Budget – $60 million. Made worldwide: $257 million.

“Lady in the Water” in 2006 lost money and got bad reviews.

“The Happening”- 2008. Budget $48 million. Made worldwide: $248 million.

“The Last Airbender” -2010. Budget $150 million. Made worldwide: $319 million. $98 million.

“Split” – 2017. Budget: $9 million. Made worldwide: $279 million.

“Glass” – 2019. Budget – $20 million. Made worldwide: $247 million.:

“Old” – 2021. Budget- $18 million. Made worldwide: $90 million.

“Knock at the Cabin” – 2023. Budget of $20 million. Opened with $14 million (#1) and has already grossed $21 million worldwide.

Profit on the 9 films above, 2,117 million for 9 films, or $235 million per film.

Split

- 2016
- James McAvoy, Anya Taylor-Joy

Old

- 2021
- Gael García Bernal, Vicky Krieps

Unbreakable

- 2000
- Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson

Signs

- 2002
- Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix

The Village

- 2004
- Sigourney Weaver, William Hurt

In his twenties, [Shyamalan] says, “I don’t think you could have told me that making thrillers for your whole life wasn’t a bad thing. At first it was a sense of, ‘Hey, I can make anything.’ But that’s hypocritical, because when I pick up an Agatha Christie novel in my library, I have a strong expectation. So, I get it … When I became happy with the idea of making thrillers for the rest of my life, everything went right.”[ This courtesy of Wikipedia.]

So, how thrilling is “Knock at the Cabin”? It held our interest, for sure.

The script, co-written by Shyamalan, Steve Desmond, and Michael Sherman (adapting Paul Tremblay’s book The Cabin at the End of the World), is a binary plot concept, not a twist. (Shymalan has abandoned the idea that every film he makes must have a “surprise” ending, even if audiences have not abandoned that expectation.)

For this one, you either have to accept the premise that the quartet of strangers who come upon little Wen (Kristen Cui) in the woods catching grasshoppers and putting them in a bug jar are truly psychic individuals, not unlike Richard Dreyfuss and troupe in “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and have had a major league religious vision, or you don’t buy into that truth. The bugs seem(ed) symbolic, to me, of the soon-to-be-imprisoned family members.

My husband felt there were echoes of “10: Cloverfield Lane.” I’ve already mentioned the visions of the various folk in “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” Reviewer Nick Allen felt that Jordan Peele’s “Us” echoed throughout the film, a comparison that did not resonate for me. Another mentioned Shymalan’s fascination with the End of Times (“The Happening”) and suggested he avoid the topic in the future. (Ahem).

The quartet breaks into the cabin and tells the family there that they must kill one of their three family members to prevent the end of the world. The major evidence to support their theory seems to be televised segments showing the catastrophes the quartet has predicted. The Four Horsemen (Malice, Nurturing, Guidance, Healing, says the script. Wikipedia says sword, famine, plague and the wild beasts of the Earth, among other listings.) could have pre-taped this “proof,” which Daddy Andrew points out. With all the bad people in the world, does Andrew really care about saving all (or any) of them? He’s not religious (we learn this from the adoption scene), but Eric is, and we can see that plot point coming a mile away, especially after the script says “Trust in something more than yourself.” [The uber religious will relate to that.]

The acting is good, with Ben Aldridge playing Andrew and Jonathan Groff portraying Eric. Jonathan Groff was in “Frozen” and “Mindhunters” as well as a role onstage in “Hamilton.” I swear he had a recurring role in “GLOW,” but I cannot find his name among those credits, so please drop me a line if you remember him in “GLOW” (Great Ladies of Wrestling).

The pair in the cabin is a gay couple who have adopted 8-year-old (“8 in six days”) Wen from Asia. This fulfills the obligatory plot point a homosexual or lesbian relationship must at least be alluded to in present-day film(s). I was put off by the scene near the end when Wen is told to go sit in a treehouse and wear her headphones. She is then MIA from some pretty important developments, but it will take years of therapy to overcome what she has already witnessed. Seems like too little too late, plotwise, to rush her off to a leafy hideaway and tell her to tune out.

The four attackers are led by the gentle giant Leonard, played by Dave Bautista (“Guardians of the Galaxy,” “The Glass Onion”). Leonard is a second grade teacher from Chicago and seems quite apologetic about the quartet’s need to bring pain and suffering to the family in the remote wooded cabin. The biggest “name” actor of the four is Rupert Grint as Redmond (“Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” of 2001).

We soon learn that Redmond might have a grudge against Ben, in particular, and may have actually attacked him in a bar many years before, in a fairly traumatic encounter. Is this a delayed vendetta of some sort? There are two women in the group of Crazies-or-Are-They: one is Nikki Amuka-Bird as Sabrina, a post-operative nurse. The other is Abby Quinn as Adriane. While Sabrina is a post-op nurse, Adriane seems to be a bit of a lightweight, mentally; she worked as a fry cook.

The entire 100 minute plot hinges on whether or not the intruders can convince the small family that they must sacrifice one of their own to save the world.

I thought how timely this entire plot concept of Q-Anon crazies is in a world beset with misinformation where, as we know, one such deluded fellow actually swallowed whole the entire story of Hillary Clinton operating a child trafficking ring out of a pizza parlor. There are enough lunatics on the national scene, currently, to populate a large city, and we saw many of them on January 6^th. The quartet is quite devoted to their cause, however, and use televised segments showing all of the horrible things that will occur if the family doesn’t capitulate. First, flood and earthquake. Then pestilence. Then planes falling out of the sky. Then fire. Later, we learn that the unifying device involved is the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, but please stop reading if you are unhappy that I have gone this far in discussing the plot. (I haven’t gone any further than the star of the film Dave Bautista has done in discussing the plot on national television, but I may from this point forward, so buckle up. Or don’t. Whatever. I’m going to discuss some plot concepts, and most of these plot points I have not seen discussed anywhere else.)

GAY THEME

I have seen various critics praise the idea of the family in the woods being gay saying, in effect, “Bring it on!” I have no argument with having the family be gay, bi-sexual, trans, lesbian or any other segment of the population. It seemed timely. While I applaud the culture for being accepting of any depiction of a loving family, I am more interested in the mechanics of trying to either accept or reject the binary plot points that will determine how this film plays out. It is overdue for minorities of various sorts to receive equal and fair treatment and opportunities; I wonder if the % of the plot occurrences will ever match the % of each minority in the nation as a whole?

SCRIPT

At one point, the script says, “There’s always a choice. Our choices make our destiny. Will you make a choice to save the world?” Psychology 101.

ONE WORD OF CAUTION

Why is acquiring a gun the salvation of the family? Does anyone other than me think we have way more guns (and gun owners) now than we need? Encouraging more people to go buy guns, if an unintended consequence of the film, was NOT the timely message I hoped for. However, once Daddy Andrew (Ben Aldridge) does get his hands on a gun, near the film’s climax, it makes no sense that he wouldn’t use it on Leonard. This didn’t really compute, for me, but, then, that is true of many points in many movies (as I’m sure you would agree.) I won’t hold that against Shymalan. Reminds me of the time my brother-in-law gave me a hard time in my first novel (“The Color of Evil”) because my psychotic killer clown escapes from a prison van while being transferred from one prison to another. Uncle Mark contended that massive amounts of security would have been on hand to transfer the dangerous criminal. Maybe he was right; maybe I was right. (I had addressed the staffing issue.) A bit of suspension of belief and leeway is due the creative guru IMHO.

TIMELY MESSAGES

On the other hand, all of the catastrophes that the quartet foretold are very timely (and well illustrated). Tsunamis (check). Cities flooding. (Check) Deadly plague (Check. See Covid). Planes plunging to Earth. (Check). Fire (California Burning.) Crazy people ranting (Marjorie Taylor Green, Q-Anon, and half of the Republican party). Plus the entire lack of faith in faith in anything (government, religion, marriage, etc.) on a lot of people’s parts, which this film also capitalizes upon.

MUSIC

As any good Hitchcock fan knows, the music can make the moment. Hitchcock’s partnership with Bernard Herrmann or Damian Chazelle’s partnership with Justin Hurwitz or Jordan Peele’s collaborations with Michael Abels are examples. Here, the composer of the score is Herdis Stefansdottir. The Music Supervisor was Susan Jacobs. The film really benefits from the music.

CINEMATOGRAPHY

Camerawork from Jarin Blaschke and Lowell A. Meyer is excellent. You will note that the choice to pull away from acts of intentional violence inflicted by the attackers on themselves is made by Shymalan. I’m always reticent to watch explicit gore of the splatter or any other variety. You may feel differently. Your choice, but I liked Shymalan’s discretion here.

CONCLUSION

M. Night Shymalan lives on a 125 acre estate near Philadelphia. His fans, like Taylor Swift’s “Swifties,” are quite devoted. Therefore, he has complete creative control, has garnered Oscar nominations for some of his films, does a great job, and is laughing all the way to the bank. This is not to suggest that just making money is any kind of criteria for works of art, but this latest offering is both enjoyable, interesting, well-done, and profitable. Like the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, that’s a dynamite combination. I didn’t like it as much as 2016’s “Split,” but I do think it was a return to form (from “Old”) for Shymalan. Try it, if you’ve liked any of his previous films.

M. Night Shymalan’s “Old” Leads the Box Office on July 23rd, 2021 Weekend

By Connie Wilson

On July 26, 2021

In Best Paranormal Stories Online to Read | Paranormal Podcast, Movies, Pop Culture, Reviews, Scary stories

Night Shymalan has always investigated original concepts, ideas that are out-of-the-box, even in his iconic 1999 film “The Sixth Sense.” He has had his share of hits or misses, scoring with “Split” in 2016 and less so with “Glass,” television’s “Wayward Pines,” “Signs,” “The Village,” and “Lady in the Water.”

We’ve gotten spoiled by some of Shymalan’s “twist” endings. It’s unfair to hold the writer/director to “Sixth Sense” exacting standards every time out. Shymalan largely funds his own films himself; it looks like a lot of Bollywood talent was employed on “Old,” which was shot in the Dominican Republic.

THE PLOT:

A family is embarking on what may be their last trip as a unit. Parents Guy (Gail Garcia Bernal) and Prisca (Vicky Krieps) have taken their 6-year-old son Trent and their 11-year-old daughter Maddox on vacation.

Mom and Dad are having some difficulties in their personal relationship. Each has a health issue (Gail Garcia Bernal’s health issue is a blood-clotting problem. His wife, Prisca’s, ailment is a tumor.) As the plot progresses we will learn that most of the tourists at the resort have a health issue of one sort or another.

Prisca thinks she wants out of the marriage and has been unfaithful, but she wants to protect their 6 year-old son Trent and their 11-year-old daughter Maddox from this unhappy personal news and give them one last happy family outing.We get to see three different sets of actors portray the children, gradually aging them as the beach does its thing. It is unclear why Mom and Dad barely age and one of the film’s flaws.

When the family reaches the resort, they are met by Madrid, carrying a tray of drinks. The actress is Francesca Eastwood, the 28-year-old daughter of Clint Eastwood and actress Frances Fisher, offering them a drink based on their preferences. Later. the managing director of the resort suggests that the family can be transported to a hidden secret beach. They board a van (driven by none other than Director Shymalan, who usually appears briefly in his films, a la Hitchcock) and are dropped off at the remote beach with the understanding that they will be picked back up at 5 p.m.

That last bit of housekeeping turns out to be bogus. If they try to leave the beach they pass out from mysterious and painful headaches and wind up unconscious on the beach. One tourist, who attempts to swim out, doesn’t make it. (Famous last words: “Don’t worry. I was on the swim team.”) One who tries to climb the forbidding-looking cliffs that surround the beach falls to her death.

Getting off the beach is a bitch, but if they stay, they are going to die there as they quickly age 2 years an hour. If you’re there 24 hours, you’ll age 48 years. That will quickly kill off the elderly woman (Agnes) with the dog, Dr. Charles’ mother. It also takes its toll on any health concerns, like Prisca’s slow-going tumor that is suddenly catapulted into hyper-drive. Having time telescope so rapidly brings the parents back to their senses and makes them realize what they have in their marriage, but it’s too little, too late.

The premise of a mysterious beach that can cause the body to age 2 years in one hour is intriguing. Especially in the wake of this pandemic year, an event that has not happened for one hundred years and one which has touched so many of us on a deeply personal level, this is something we can relate to. As we have watched an insidious killer take our friends and loved ones, the theme of mortality and time changing all things dramatically has become poignantly relevant to one in three Americans who have lost close friends or loved ones. The idea of time flying by and robbing us of our looks, our health, and, ultimately, our very lives, is something that any human being can relate to even in normal times—but even more so in a plague year.

THE GOOD

The premise is interesting and worthwhile. It has been adapted from the graphic novel “Sandcastle” by Pierre Oscar-Levy/Frederick Peeters. The dialogue in the adaptation for the screen by Shymalan does not really flow well. There is a lot of information introduced by having the young son of parents Prisca (Vicky Krieps of “The Phantom Thread”) and Guy (Gabriel Barcia Bernal of “Mozart in the Jungle”) ask everyone who they are and what they do. This technique does not yield the smoothest flow of information or dialogue. It’s even klutzier than a voice-over would have been.

SPOILERS

One of the problems with the film is the pace of the plot. It moves too quickly over momentous events with no time to build up any interest in whatever character has just bitten the dust. There are dead bodies turning up floating in the water, attacks by a paranoid schizophrenic tourist on the beach, and the group doesn’t wait around to act. Example: letting the doctor on the beach operate with a pocket knife roughly five minutes after a tumor’s acceleration in size causes Prisca to pass out. That seemed a tad speedy. There was talk of whether the group had any alcohol to use as an antiseptic. If the answer was yes, we never saw the antiseptic materialize before Dr. Charles (Rufus Sewell, who played the Fuhrer John Smith in “The Man in Castle the High Castle”) was plunging what looked like an old pocketknife into Prisca’s mid-section.

Another ridiculous plot point has one family’s young daughter mature from six to adolescence, become pregnant by Guy’s son (who has also accelerated from the age of six) without even a compulsory sex scene, and—voila!—she delivers a baby on the beach, all in record time.

I turned to my husband and said, “You wouldn’t want to doze off on this beach with this group around. They’d be throwing dirt in your face in your grave before you nodded off.”

THE BAD:

The inclusion of an instantaneous pregnancy and childbirth and the impromptu operation-on-the-tumor did not enhance the film or buttress its believability. Far from it. Both could well have been omitted, as could some of the many tourists.

For instance, the big Black character, a rapper known as Mid-sized Sedan (Aaron Pierre), never really was necessary, other than to be the object of a random attack by Rufus Sewell playing Charles, the dotty doctor.

I just watched Rufus Sewell portray Nazi Fuhrer John Smith in the final season of “The Man in the High Castle.” Watching him randomly puncture people with sharp objects was quite the change of pace. (We later learn in the film that, while he is a cardiac thoracic surgeon, he is suffering from mental health issues).Charles has a much-younger hot wife (Abbey Lee of “Mad Max Fury Road” and “Lovecraft Country”) and Chrystal displays her toned bikini body alongside Charles’ elderly mother, Agnes (Kathleen Chalfant), before Agnes shuffles off this mortal coil. Chrystal’s demise in a cave was like something out of a third-rate horror movie. Chrystal didn’t really offer much to the film other than her beach body.

CINEMATOGRAPHY:

While there were some crafty shots that concealed the reaction of the parents to their children’s sudden aging until the final moment, there were so many blurry unframed shots from Cinematographer Michael Gioulakis that I thought the cliffs were making me dizzy, too. One critic praised the blurry focus. I was not a fan. The cinematography and music were unremarkable, but the beach—which gave the director fits—was spectacular.

MUSIC:

There is a song called “Remain,” composed by Saleka Night Shymalan, that was tuneless and forgettable.

VERDICT:

Overall, I was not impressed with the film as a whole, but I always find M. Night Shymalan’s hits or misses interesting and original.