An average movie

Nowadays, M. Night Shyamalan has become the laughing stock of the film community but there was a time when he was considered one of the most promising directors in the world. Some people would argue that it started to go wrong already with this flick but I don’t agree, in my opinion, it started to turn sour with ‘Lady in the water’(still his worst movie in my opinion) whereas this movie was well received and a success at the box-office. At the time, Mel Gibson was still a bankable actor and it would be his last hit before he focused on his directing projects and on ruining his public image. Anyway, I thought it was a fairly entertaining story, there is no denying that Shyamalan knows how to direct a thriller and there was a very strong cast (Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix, Rory Culkin, Abigail Breslin). The biggest issue was eventually the ending. I mean, it was all very nice and efficient, especially in delivering an ominous mood but they had to provide an interesting climax at some point, not necessarily an explanation (see ‘Inception’ or anything directed by David Lynch), but you need to manage to end your tale in a satisfactory way and that’s where Shyamalan fails every time, even with ‘The Sixth Sense’ which I consider one of the most overrated movies ever made. This time again, the ending was quite ridiculous, borderline laughable, and above all, it was yet again a twist ending. It was already the 3rd time in a row that Shyamalan used this trick and his audience was already getting quite fed up with this gimmick. Still, in spite of this underwhelming ending, the rest of the movie is actually pretty good and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

6/10