Hey Man, Can't We All Just Get Along?
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Gary Gulman at Helium Comedy Club
I'm one of those people who likes M. Night Shyamalan's stuff, and not just because he comes from around here, and makes all his movies here (although that's very nice). I like his films because, even when they're ultimately not that good, they still have brilliance and greatness in them. I defy anyone to tell me the man is not a talented filmmaker. He can compose beautiful images and tell a story with them like nobody's business.
The problem is, sometimes the story he tells isn't that well put together in terms of logic, and falls apart as soon as you start thinking about it (Signs). And sometimes the story isn't really that interesting or believable (The Village). The Sixth Sense, on the other hand, has a beautifully constructed story, beautifully told, and with beautiful images. It is, as far as I'm concerned, a perfect film, and Shyamalan's masterpiece. The sad thing is, it was his first film, and he's never made anything as good since then. Unbreakable came the closest; it has an ending you really have to get used to, but it's a wonderful idea that's only occasionally hard to believe.
But the point is, I feel like with this much talent the man has got to have at least one more truly great film in him. So I keep watching and waiting for it. Sadly, I'm going to have to keep waiting a little longer, because Lady in the Water isn't it. In fact, I'm sad to report, it's probably Shyamalan's worst film to date (are they getting worse each time, or is it just me?). The story is again a bit hard to believe, as well as being flimsy and rushed. I once thought that the best thing you could do for an artist was to give him complete freedom over the creative process, and that then he would be able to produce great masterpieces. Then I saw what happened to George Lucas's work when he had complete control, and I think this is not true at all. In fact, an artist and his ego need to be reigned in a bit (obstructed, if you will) to make something great. There has to be conflict, constraints, someone to tell him "no" every once in a while when he has a bad idea.
Lady in the Water started life as a bedtime story that Shyamalan told to his children. He decided it would make a good movie, and if anyone was there to tell him "no," he ignored them. So we end up with a fairy tale that is rather childish and derivative, and is really overall just not that interesting. (And if you're about to object that it's a bedtime story, so of course it has to be childish, I disagree; you can write a good children's story without being childish about it.) The film starts off on the wrong foot immediately with a lengthy, incredibly cliched, exposition-heavy, and patronizing animated prologue. "Once man lived in peace with the fairies, then he started buying things and fighting, and that was bad." Gah! Certainly now is the time for an anti-war film, but one that states the point like this? I don't think so. I hated this prologue as soon as it started, and knew immediately that it would be unnecessary, and that all this information would come out in the film itself, and I was right.
Thankfully the movie picks up a bit after the prologue, as it introduces us to the setting of the film (a Philadelphia-area apartment complex called The Cove) and its cast of enjoyably wacky characters, including the lonely, broken-hearted superintendent Cleveland Heep. Cleveland Heep is a fantastic name, and the man who plays Heep, Paul Giamatti, is fantastically talented. He takes what is essentially a rather familiar stereotype - a sad, shy, broken, stuttering man (yes, he even stutters!) who has given up on life - and makes him fresh and alive.
The story gets started quickly, and then doesn't let up until the credits roll. (There will be some spoilers here, but few that you couldn't already have figured out from the commercials.) Heep finds a vaguely creepy-looking Bryce Dallas Howard in the pool (or really, she finds him), and pretty much immediately recognizes that she is a creature from a fairy tale, and that he must help her accomplish her fairy tale task of inspiring a human being and then returning to her own land ("the Blue World"). This requires him to protect her from an evil camouflaged wolf-beastie roaming the grounds of the building, and to gather together a band of people with magical powers to help her. All of this is told rather well, and accompanied by some amusing comedy and some tense drama. One difficult problem, however, is that it's essential to the pacing of the story that Heep and all the other characters believe immediately in the girl's other-worldliness, and in the tasks that they have to perform. And yet, it's also very hard to understand why they would. I mean, these are meant to be modern-day Philadelphians (or at least Pennsylvanians), the kind of cynical people who have a hard time believing in things even when you show them documented proof. But they swallow whole the concept of a water nymph and a giant magical eagle, and then say thank you, can I have some more?
Worse, Shyamalan's reportedly gigantic ego is showing in multiple places in the film (more spoilers follow): he casts himself as the genius artist that the nymph must inspire so that his work can change the world for the better (and admittedly he does okay in the part, but a professional actor probably would have been better), and creates the character of a bitter, hateful film critic just so he can kill him later on in the movie for pretty much no reason at all except that he doesn't like film critics (the monster kills this man, and only this man, even though its supposed target is a woman who is at that moment in a totally different part of the building).
Btw, you may be wondering what the answer is to the first question my wife asked me about the film when I got back from seeing it, which was, "So, what was the twist?" I realized that I'd completely forgotten about Shyamalan's predilection for surprise endings, perhaps partially because there really isn't one here. The few "surprises" are things I saw coming about a mile away. Which was also a bit disappointing.
And "disappointing" is pretty much the word I'd use to describe the film overall. It's nice enough, and maybe okay for kids (well, slightly older kids; there are some scary bits), but the brilliance that shines around the edges of Shyamalan's other films (even the poor ones) has almost completely vanished here. This is a pretty good movie, but it's not at all the masterpiece I was hoping for.
Image Credit: Empire Movies
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