I hope that the current M.Night Shyamalan film Devil returns the Shamhammer to a respectful status. Audiences are not forgiving to directors who fall from their former hieghts.
In the theater, a group of people were watching the trailers right behind me. Devil came on, and through the whole thing the verbal film critic behnd me was reacting appropriately with glee about this suspenseful film he was seeing a preview for. “That looks awesome!” he squeed like an anxious fanboy. Then the name M.Night Shyamalan faded in and he was “oh, nevermind – that’s going to suck”
And this is hardly a new trend. Even the studio has played down selling the movie based on his name. It does look decent, but people are less likely to give it a shot.
But it seems there is hope on the horizon. One of the stories Shamhammer wrote as a proposed sequel to Unbreakable will likely be the basis of the third Night Chronicles films, of which Devil is the first.
I cannibalized the idea for the sequel to ‘Unbreakable’ for one of the Night Chronicles…It was such a cool idea for a villain, and it was actually originally in the script for ‘Unbreakable,’ and it was too much…There were too many villains, so I pulled this villain out and was like, ‘I’ll make this the second flick.’…I fleshed it out more and more, and thought, ‘This could be a standalone movie.’
I’ll just say it: the third ‘Night Chronicles’ movie is what would have been the sequel [to ‘Unbreakable’].
The first of the films slated as the Night Chronicles is of course Devil. The “Night Chronicles” title was dropped from promotion due to the negative association, but the studio is still confident in the film. The second appears to be Twelve Strangers, which we are hearing movement on now.
So this third could be an unofficial sequel to Unbreakable, but likely not called Unbreakable 2.
I didn’t think Unbreakable needed a sequel, but I really dug the idea of a superhero movie without all the flash and tights of your typical action film. Another story set in that same tone would be great.
Unbreakable is my favourite M.Night film.
I might be in the minority on this one. I’ve enjoyed every one of M. Night’s movies. Perhaps M. Night is earning the same “reputation” as Kevin Costner: you either “get” his movies or you don’t.
OOOH I for one “Get Them” But I also “get” headaches as well.
The deal breaker was in The Village for me.
He (Joaquin) jumps the fence in the end and there you have it (Twist ending!) seems he actually was leaving a Reneassance Festival.
laughable!
You might want to watch the movie again.
Joaquin doesn’t jump the fence. It was Bryce Dallas Howard. She escapes the “reserve” and gets her medicine and doesn’t ruin the mystique for everyone else living in seclusion because she is blind.
Its a good story, but by that point we were waiting for the Twist in any film he does anyways.
The first two times I saw Scott Pilgrim (Thursday midnight and Friday night), the entire audience groaned or booed when his name came up. It was pretty funny. I didn’t think the movie looked that great anyway but his name came up and I just have to feel like it’s going to be a pile of crap. I haven’t moderately enjoyed anything of his since Unbreakable (which I do love).
I’m guilty of the same reaction with him. I’ve even read critics reviews summorizing the same opinion.
My favorite line from one of those e-critics was:(The Happening)
“The movie sucked so bad that John Leguizamo actually tried to kill himself in the scene were he walks out the car and cuts his wrist’s with broken glass.” or something to that effect.
That’s the same reaction I got when I went to see Inception. Everyone was all excited, but when Night’s name came up a disappointing “oh” came up in the theater. I just bought Unbreakable last week on DVD cause it was for soo cheap and really enjoyed it. So Unbreakable vs. Devil?
The movie sucked! Caught an advance screening the other night! Horrible.