Very quick "Lady in the Water" thoughts (some spoilers...few big ones)

[Godhumor]

I do not want to step on Radio_Lady's toes with this, but I just need to say something about this movie...

It's horrible.

It's horrible in a lot of ways, but the worst is that it takes itself seriously, and it shouldn't.


Let me do a quick drive-by in bullet format:

- The basic premise is actually pretty neat--there are two worlds living in co-existence with each other. Our world and the "Blue World" that lives underwater. The two worlds drifted apart, because humankind wants to own everything. When we lost contact with the Blue World we become violent.

- The good people of the Blue World, nymphs called narfs, are trying to reestablish contact with our world. They do this by sending their young out onto our land to have them inspire an "awakening" in individuals.

- There are creatures who disguise themselves as grass called scrunts that hunt and kill narfs when they leave the Blue World, so it's dangerous to leave.

Simple enough, so let's start talking about where it goes wrong.

- The narf awakens a human by looking at the person (vessel) he or she has been assigned. When that person sees their narf, he or she feels a pins and needles sensation through their body.

- Bryce Howard's role as the narf consists of looking at one person and then cowering the rest of the film. Seriously, that's her entire job. The entire movie is based on her looking at one person. I just wonder if M. Night Shyamalan ever thought to himself, "So...she looks at him and then...oh to hell with the then. She just looks at 'im."

- The main character, Cleveland Heep, manages to discover the entire history and purpose of Story (name of the narf) by asking a young Korean woman to look up "narf" in her textbook. It turns out she already knows what a narf is, as her mother used to tell bedtime stories about them. Through the mother, Heep figures out her purpose, the creatures hunting her, and the roles of the humans who are destined to protect and help her (the healer, guardian, interpreter, and guild). It is a massive stretch of almost unbelievable proportions, that two people living in this tiny apartment complex know the history of the Blue World--who have kept themselves pretty much secret for thousands of years. Shyamalan tries to explain it away with a one sentence comment along the lines that the right people were drawn to the apartment building long before the narf came (which just opens up an entirely different unresolved plot point of whether the Blue World denizens can control us, but I digress.), but it just doesn't work for me. Heep goes from clueless to completely filled in within a few minutes, and never once does he question the information, the source, or the validity. I almost threw my shoe at the screen.

- The rest of the movie is Heep assembling the team of humans he thinks are the promised roles and trying to get her back to the Blue World while protecting her from the evil scrunt.

- If you know the Shyamalan formula you know nothing is ever straightforward. There is no "twist" this time around, but I figured out who the "real" helpers were within 30 seconds of the positions (healer, guardian, etc.) being announced.

- The scene with the interpreter is just ungodly awful and actually made the theater patrons laugh out loud--and not because it was funny.

- The only fatality in the entire movie is an unlikable movie critic--apparently poor M. Night has some issues with criticism.

- Shyamalan has gone from cameo to supporting lead in this movie, and he absolutely has no idea how to act. It was an act of sheer ego that brought a bad movie down even farther.

- A lot of things were never explained at all (Why did the narf steal stuff from people? How did the Koreans know the Blue World legend
Overall, I can't say anything positive about this movie. It saddens me to see just how far Shyamalan has fallen since the "Sixth Sense".

[Broken_Hero]

1. damn

my guess of the "twist" was really off...the premise of the movie, does sound good though...I will probably catch this on dvd, later on...my movie theater funds, are depleted...

[Godhumor]

2. The premise sounds good...the execution is tragic

I think of all the possibilities you can do with a setting where two worlds live on top of each other with one being unaware of the other. I then think about this movie and how such a great idea was so horribly wasted and destroyed.

It reminds me of "Event Horizon", which had this incredible premise of your most personal and debilitating fear takes form and turns it into a slasher pic. Great potential, botched reality in both cases.

[Broken_Hero]

3. I enjoyed Event Horizon

but agree it could have been better...:) The premise of LITW sounds pretty good, like you mentioned, the two worlds converging, and what not...

[Broken_Hero]

4. As for movies, with a two world connect

I recommend Dark City to you...that movie, really took me by surprise, and I enjoyed it GREATLY...I bought it on a whim, and was greatly, surprised...:)

[Godhumor]

5. Huh, I accidentally edited some stuff out

In my original post where it says a lot of this were never explained at all the parentheses used to include all of the following:

- Why did the narf steal stuff from people?

- How do Koreans know the Blue World legend?

- why can narfs see into the future?

- why did Story not use this power as she met each person to figure out who her helpers were and what position they filled?

- Why do scrunts hate narfs?

- Why does simply looking at a narf cause an awakening?

- How are individual vessels assigned to a narf? Why can't they awaken anyone they come in contact with?

- Why do all of the characters accept as truth that an underwater naked lady came to land and that the lawn tried to attack her when Heep tells them about it? Shouldn't someone express some skepticism?

- If our worlds have been kept apart why do any humans have powers that work within the narf's realm (healing, fending off the scrunt, etc.)?

- Why do narfs have no defenses themselves against their own enemies?


Ugh.

[zonkers]

6. poss. spoiler... (though I havent seen it) Your review seems to confirm

my gut feeling about M Night. The Sixth Sense was terrific and a hard act to follow. Didn't see Village. But Signs was shallow and disappointing. It pretty much convinced me he was not the real deal but just a film school kid with some talent, riding Sixth Sense's success. And besides finding him pretentious in interviews, something bugs me about how he casts Ron Howard's daughter (Village, Lady) in his films. It seems so political, like its insurance that they will not get lost in the market place.

I found it astounding that Signs made hundreds of millions. It is a testament to the Hollywood marketing machine.

[Skittles]

8. I found it astonishing no one seemed to guess the end of Sixth Sense

I guessed it FROM THE TRAILER.....HELLO, the boy says I SEE DEAD PEOPLE!!

[Godhumor]

10. Heh, true story (6th Sense spoilers)

When "6th Sense" first came out I was working part-time as an assistant manager at a local Blockbuster. My manager absolutely loved the movie, and I waited about a month after its release to go see it. As I was leaving the store to head to the theater, my manager says, "You'll love it, the surprise is amazing!"

I responded as a joke, "What that Bruce Willis is dead?"

"She gaped and asked, "How did you know that?"

I ended up going to the movie bitter that the amazing twist was so predictable.

[zonkers]

11. I happened to see the film before I saw the trailer. Let me tell you,

the collective gasp in the theatre was pretty amazing. Though I have met many who say the same as you.

[Skittles]

18. I was surprised he was shot though

I guessed he'd be in a really bad car accident

[Skittles]

7. read THIS scathing review

says watching this flick is "like walking in on your roommate masturbating to a picture of himself: :o
http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/view.php?id=12636

[Godhumor]

9. Read it earlier

My thoughts on the movie are pretty close to those in the review. Of course, I can't turn a metaphor quite as well :)

[Radio_Lady]

13. Hi, Godhumor! Welcome to the DU! Catch you later -- I'm up WAY too

late for a senior citizen!

[Broken_Hero]

14. Yes, its waaaay past your bedtime!

Now, be sure to brush your teeth, and get to bed!...;)

[Godhumor]

15. Thanks for the welcome, but I've been around a long time

Just haven't posted much--the Lounge seems to have brought me out of lurkers' paradise.

The only thing that made the film tonight bearable was the fact that the Rochester screening happened at a mall. I went book shopping after it let out.

[ghostsofgiants]

12. All of M. Night Shyamalan's films could be described that way, I think.

[Frank Cannon]

19. LOL

:rofl:

That's pretty harsh.

[BlueIris]

16. Ouch. That sounds appalling.

Shyamalan's problem is clear to me, though. He aspires to create stories out of moods...with little to no idea about what makes a compelling premise into a workable plot, let alone a suspenseful, sensical plot. Also--I think he froze up after "Signs" for some reason and totally forgot what he was once on the road to being able to do as a storyteller. "Signs" was a decent film, I thought, in which the mood receives more emphasis than the plot, sure, and yeah, that in and of itself is arguably a big flaw in a movie like that as the premise is so emotionally loaded and needs as meaningful a resolution as you can get, but I thought M. Night pulled that one out okay. It's not like he was trying to cure cancer or anything. "The Village"? Is one of the worst films I've ever seen. Because the "twist," which isn't believable to begin with...at all...simply doesn't live up to the promise of the premise as it was constructed and then is so poorly revealed that our entire theater was laughing during "the scene."

I had high, high hopes for this guy, I really did. As a creator obsessed with mood, I was really excited by the idea that a film director could make intense, moody films that were also engaging, entertaining, suspenseful and meaningful. But films with powerful moods should still have stories, especially if they're suspense films and he doesn't seem to "get" that you have to have a workable story, with a workable premise and then make the whole thing work before you hit pre-production. It's fine to start with a mood and go from there...but then you have to go someplace. And I think the OP is right that he has some issues with ego and criticism--because if he didn't, he'd have taken heed of what I'm sure hundreds of people have tried to tell him by this point: get a damn book on basic fiction writing, M. Night. Before you waste another 100+ mill on you're next disaster...if they even let you make one.

[Hissyspit]

17. "Signs" was AWFUL. n/t