M. Night Should Have Made the Unbreakable Trilogy Instead

So, I finally broke down last week and watched M. Night Shyamalan’s 2000 thriller / comic book movie Unbreakable. I had put the movie off for ages because, well, I hate M. Night Shyamalan and his movies (something that has been well documented on this site). The guy cannot direct actors to save his life, his films often rely on ridiculous twist endings, and the guy is truly an arrogant prick in real life. I thought the Sixth Sense was overrated and I hated both Signs and The Village. I haven’t seen his other latest films but, from what I hear, they are pretty God-awful. With that said, I’ve always heard that, even if you do hate M. Night and his films, you should give Unbreakable a shot. The horrible aftertaste the guy has left in my mouth has kept me from doing so until I saw the movie on sell at Movie Gallery for nine bucks. Finally, I said what the hell, swallowed my pride, and gave the thing a shot.

I gotta say that it was a pretty damn good movie. Basically, it was everything I loved about comic book films and then some. Actually, it was the kind of superhero movie that I’ve been fantasizing about making for years. Grounded completely in reality, Unbreakable makes the concept of superheroes and villains actually seem feasible and at times, even logical. After all, if there is someone whose bones are so brittle that they break every time that they fall, could there not be someone at the other end of the spectrum? It’s an interesting concept that M. Night only makes more interesting and breathes more energy into by injecting comic mythology into the mix. From the opening text over black, you can tell that this is going to be a film centered and focused on comic books, their popularity, and all the interesting concepts they tend to have. It feels like a film made by a raging comic book geek and that vibe definitely won me over since I am  a comic book nerd myself. My favorite sequence would have to be when Elijah Price is first introduced to a comic book by his mother on a park bench. The way the introduction is filmed gives the comic book itself a sense of magic, allure and mystery. With that one rotating shot, M. Night managed to actually get across the love and attraction that so many tend to feel towards comics without overdoing it or saying a word. It’s just all done subtly through crafty visuals. I loved it.

M. Night also did a great good at using visuals and a color palette to get across the nature of the main character’s world. For example, as the film goes on, the world of Elijah Price goes from a very warm and colorful world to a very pale, blue, and sterile environment. On the other hand, David Dunn’s world goes from a blue, depressing environment (as he deals with the possible breaking up of his family and other troubles) to a very warm, almost comic-bookish coloring. It’s all very subtly done and suggests that a lot of time and thought went into something that usually only works on a subconscious level for most viewers.

I also felt that M. Night did a great job with his direction to put the viewers right into David Dunn’s head and the crazy world he is about to fall into. Unlike many directors today, M. Night’s shot length is very long and he uses it to get across many emotions and tell his story like a pro. The long shot at the beginning of the film between David Dunn and a possible fling on a train not only gets across a fairly realistic conversation between two people that have very different internal motives but also the state of David’s soul and the downfall that he is going through on so many personal levels. There are many other examples of this kind of direction throughout the film where M. Night uses great shot length and impeccable framing to not only further the storytelling of his film but to get across much deeper concepts and human emotions.

And how about Samuel L. Jackson as Elijah Price (as known as “Mr. Glass”)? First off, talk about an awesome character design. Everything from the purple suits and his glass cane to that wacky Fredrick Douglas inspired hair duo made this guy right out of a comic book… although Jackson’s strong, obsessive performance grounded him in reality. I loved it. I know a lot of people say that Jackson is a movie whore and just about plays the same role in every film but you cannot watch this film and say that again. Jackson’s character has a great pathos to him and you really feel for him and want his friendship with Dunn, no matter how unhealthy it may seem to be at first, to flourish. My favorite scene with the guy would have to be that bit where he’s in the comic book store and refuses to leave. His body language and the way he keep turning the wheel chair into the shelves was hilarious. I just loved this character and the way that Jackson chose to play him. It was fun to watch.

As I stated earlier, this film is just filled with comic book geekiness. Of course, in order for the film to remain grounded in reality, it is all handled pretty subtly, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. One scene that really got across the love and appreciation for comics (other than the scene where Elijah gets his first comic book as described earlier) is the scene in “Limited Edition” where Elijah berates a customer for trying to buy a rare, original art print for an Action Comics cover from 1935 for his four year old son. As Elijah states, it’s not something that you would buy from a toy store for a toddler- it’s a piece of art. Like many others, I feel the same way about many comics and graphic novels today (no matter how rare or old they are)- they are truly pieces of art. It’s a shame that they don’t get recognized as such more often but I’m glad that M. Night saw this aspect of love for comics and was able to put this view on the screen so successful. After all, there are many collectors today just like Elijah who collect artwork from comics. I’m sure they view it just the same. I also appreciated how M. Night managed to get the classic comic book origin story mythos to apply to the realistic story of Unbreakable. While I won’t go into the film’s “twist ending” (something that is right out of a comic book to be honest… I was into it unlike some other viewers), there are many other things that he did in order to inject this mythos without making it cheesy or unrealistic. One example would be how David comes into his own superhero personality, even with a costume. The costume is simple and, at first, you may not even recognize it as a costume. However, as one sequence towards the end of the film begins to unfold as he wears this costume, you start to realize what it is due to the larger than life M. Night plans to film David and his movements and his choice of lighting. He manages to make the guy seem like a superhero without all the flashiness that we usually expect from a comic book film. Overall, it was a comic book nerd’s dream to see all of this unfold on my television screen.

So, is there anything that I didn’t like about Unbreakable? Well, yeah, kind of. First off, like I have stated many times before, M. Night has a tendency to direct his actors to fairly emotionless performances. Most of the time, I feel like these people act more like robots and aliens than actual people (hell, I’d even go as far to say that the aliens were more human-like than the people in Signs, M. Night’s most overrated film IMO). Unfortunately, there are some more moments of acting such as this in the beginning half of Unbreakable, but luckily for me, these moments did not dominate the film and were not as distracting or cringe inducing as they usually tend to be. Also, what is M. Night’s obsession with couples going through a divorce or separation of some kind? This guy must have seen some really brutal divorces or separations in his family as a kid or something because this kind of thing seems to come up in most of his movies. Lastly, there’s just M. Night himself. One of the things that just keeps me from sympathizing with M. Night and his recent downfall in cinema is his overly cocky and arrogant manner in regards to his films. This guy is full of himself to sickening level and, because of that, it’s really hard to enjoy any of his films, let alone feel sorry for him as he churns out shitfest after shitfest. It is this aspect of his character that kept me from seeing this film for so long and that is unfortunate. After watching the movie and thoroughly enjoying it, I decided to watch the special features. Well, that was a big mistake. In the behind the scenes documentary, M. Night has the balls to state that he was able to make the film and identify with the story because it was “about someone coming to the realization that they have a special gift that no one else has.” Hmmm… I wonder whom he’s talking about there? Unbreakable was great and original and all, but M. Night’s still an arrogant little asshole.

So, if you haven’t seen Unbreakable, I definitely suggest that you go out and give it a shot, no matter how you feel about M. Night and his films. It was definitely one of the best “blind buys” I’ve ever made. It has basically everything you could want from a superhero movie- great acting, strong characters, a fresh comic book mythos, a love for it’s source material (which is all comics), a contained feel of realism, and a solid comic book movie score by James Newton Howard. I’ve heard rumors that M. Night had planned to make this into his own comic book trilogy before the film came out and was ill-received due to bad marketing from Touchstone Pictures (instead of marketing it as a superhero film, they decided to push it as a supernatural thriller due to M. Night’s surprising overnight success from The Sixth Sense). It’s unfortunate that the movie did not go over so well with everyone (my dad hated it- once again, he was expecting a supernatural thriller) because I would have much rather preferred to get an Unbreakable trilogy from M. Night than the recent cinema that he has given us. I would tell him to put aside The Last Airbender and go after the Unbreakable trilogy instead but, after what I’ve seen of The Happening, he may not have the drive and talent to pull one of these movies off again. Maybe it’s better that he just leaves this series alone after all… Still, it would have been nice to get the last two parts of the trilogy when the guy was still in his prime. If you haven’t already, check this movie out- it’s the only M. Night Shyamalan movie that you have to see. 

9/10