Review #917 - Unbreakable (2000)
THE SCOOP
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Cast: Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, Robin Wright
Plot: A suspense thriller with supernatural overtones that revolves around a man who learns something extraordinary about himself after a devastating accident.
Genre: Drama / Mystery / Sci-Fi
Awards: -
Runtime: 106min
Rating: PG for mature thematic elements including some disturbing violent content, and for a crude sexual reference.
IN RETROSPECT (Spoilers: NO)
“They say this one has a surprise ending.”
Composer
James Newton Howard and writer-director M. Night Shyamalan are a formidable
pairing. In Unbreakable, some of the finest work they have done together are on
show. Howard talks about a singular
quality to his music for the film, how it evokes direct imagery and its
associative emotions from a film I would describe as a superhero origin movie
masquerading as a mystery-drama starring Bruce Willis.
Willis
who plays a security guard at a stadium survives a horrific train wreck
unscathed. Slowly, he finds out his true
destiny. Opposite Willis is Samuel L.
Jackson, who plays Mr. Glass, a highly unfortunate man cursed with a fragile
body since birth. Like Jackie Chan, he
has broken almost every bone in his body, but he holds the answers to
everything, while surprising us in the epilogue in a monologue that gives
shocking power to Shyamalan's film. But
that is relative.
The
genius of Shyamalan in The Sixth Sense
(1999), a film that launched him to super stardom, was sensational to
behold. In Unbreakable, he opts for something to match the audacity of his
debut feature... and to some extent it works.
His
trademark twist endings have been a double-edged sword, but the deliberate
craft of this once brilliant filmmaker is a joy to behold - from the long takes
to affecting flashbacks to the marriage of sight and sound.
Unbreakable is about the discovery of
oneself, and Shyamalan shrewdly focuses on Willis' character as key to not only
the re-integration of his family, but also the promise of being a hero for
humanity. In this regard, the film works
on two levels: an intimate drama and a superhero movie.
And
on both levels, we see a performative reconciliation from Willis' character
with himself and also his loved ones, in particular his encounter with the
'Orange Man', and his actions with his wife and kid thereafter.
Unbreakable contains one extraordinary long
take shot outside of a window with the curtains being blown strategically to
reveal Willis' character cautiously exploring a room in a mysterious
house. Till date, it remains to be in my
opinion the single greatest example of Shyamalan's deliberate direction and
pacing. His handling of suspense in this
shot is phenomenal.
Unbreakable is underrated or overrated,
depending on where you are coming from, but it remains to be Shyamalan's most
intriguing work to date.
GRADE: B+
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