Wide Awake (1998) Reviews

Of course, nowadays, M. Night Shyamalan is ridiculed by most of the movie lovers in the whole world but there was a time when he was considered the next best thing. A year before releasing his smash hit 'The Sixth Sense', Shyamalan wrote and directed this movie which was barely noticed. As a matter of fact, although released in 1998, the film was actually produced in 1995 which is never a good omen... Anyway, I was curious to see what he did before reaching stardom so I checked it out anyway. Basically, it is a rather weak family feature, nothing more, nothing less. As usual with Shyamalan's work, the whole thing was rather pretentious and, here, he tried to deal with some serious matter such as God and spirituality but it was pretty weak in my opinion. Above all, I thought the whole thing was rather uninteresting and boring to watch. It would be the only realistic picture directed by Shyamalan (so far), he will then focus on fantastic/paranormal driven features and I think it was a smart move from him. To conclude, it is a rather average family feature and it is not really worth a look, except maybe if you are a die hard fan of M. Night Shyamalan's work.