It’s possible for some movies to have bad endings and still be good/great movies (comedy is the most common scenario for this), but unless Shyamalan has shifted gears since the should-have-been career killer Lady in the Water, he structures his movies in a way where he’s outright counting on the ending to be a big part of what the viewer judges. Hard to imagine he’s qualifying very often for the “aside from the ending, it was good” assessment.
But it’s possible my info is out of date. In my world he stopped making movies 18 years ago after he was permanently locked up in director jail.
A woman gives her son, young Glass, a comic book, and leans in and tells him very deliberately, “They say this one has a surprise ending.” My soul leaves my body, my eyes roll all the way out of my skull, my body never physically recovers. The director who enabled such an insanely hacky moment goes on cashing checks. And so it goes.
We are so far apart on this one that I like that line reading. I thought Unbreakable was proof he would be the next Hitchcock. A home run twice in a row.
Yeah, exactly this. If you do that, then you’re disqualified from the “aside from the ending, it was good category”. His movies basically are the ending.
Perhaps the only one I’ve seen, I can think of that could have qualified was “Knock at the Cabin” as I don’t think any viewer (especially one familiar with Shyamalan’s work) had any surprise at the ending. However, I think that one had a fine ending, so it doesn’t qualify for a different reason.
too gagged by its own desperate bad-assery to deliver even a fraction of the fist-pumping fun that George Lucas was able to generate in 2002. George Lucas! In 2002!
I don’t think his films are that affected by the ending due to the excellence in craft he often exhibits in the rest of the movie. The endings of most of his movies are big events to potentially contextualize everything we just saw, but it’s not like most movies where there’s no craft to appreciate outside of whether the ending works. He’s a great director. He’s great at creating little emotional moments, which is one reason I love The Village. So many deliberate shots, setups, and payoffs. I just ignore the ending.
I think the best thing he’s ever made isn’t even a movie. It’s the TV show Wayward Pines. That’s got everything Shyamalan does best when he’s cooking.
PS I prefer the ending of the book Knock at the Cabin was based on.
Alright, that was pretty okey-dokey. The absolute best part was the opening credits. A lot of clever jokes hidden in the ridiculousness throughout the whole movie. Not sure if I’ll recommend it to my wife or not though, she may love it, or she may divorce me.
Just saw Civil War. I’m going to spoiler the whole thing I guess.
Random thoughts, many of which have probably already been said better by other people here and elsewhere:
It is hardly about an American Civil War at all. Or even imo the horrors of war in general. Which is fine as far as I’m concerned. It’s much more about Dunst and the other journalists and their relationships to this stuff.
With the above said, there were plenty of clues that the WF are the “good guys”. Maybe I only think that because of my biases.
I really liked the scene where they’re briefly pinned down by the sniper and they’re talking to the soldiers and ask them who they’re fighting for and the soldier says “Oh, I didn’t know you were an R-word, he’s trying to kill me so I’m trying to kill him.”
It did, imo, a really good job of not glorifying anything.
I remember when Kirsten Dunst was a child actor and feel prettay prettay old now.
Meh. When I was working a new job and working in my new city ahead of the family, I think the lineup was The Rock, Con Air and Face Off. 1997. Maybe the Rock was a year earlier??
Double checking. Think the third flick was Air Force One. All summer releases. All stuff id see without the wife or kids.
Those four movies are each elite. What has become of modern cinema etc. I can’t imagine Face Off 2 will be good, or that I’ll be strong enough not to see it.
