Hacker News Reader

Comment by wyldfire | Hacker News Reader

Wow - Howard's character is arguably more important to the story than Phoenix's. Was he that big of a draw back then to be able to demand so much more pay? Well - he had probably been in "Gladiator" just prior, so I guess he was a hot commodity. It looks like William Hurt, Sigourney Weaver, Adrien Brody, Brendan Gleeson all got paid pretty well. The movie made money despite not finding favor with critics.

> Ebert named the film the tenth worst film of 2004 and subsequently put it on his "Most Hated" list.

I dunno, I enjoyed it. I'm a simple man.

View on HN

Same. Maybe I was a naive young adult, but I totally did not anticipate the twist in that plot. So in that regard I felt like I got my money's worth.

"Signs" was one of my favorite films of the 2000s, if you don't nitpick about the water. Suspenseful, well acted, leaves you guessing, eager for more.

Suffice to say, I eagerly anticipated "The Village" from the moment the first trailer dropped. The costumes looked cool. The colors, the creatures, the mood and the mystery.

I don't think I've ever left a theater quite so disappointed. The twist ruined what had been a magical experience for the better half of the film. I wanted the magic to endure, but I got slapped with a bad episode of "The Outer Limits".

Shyamalan remains a fantastic filmmaker for his hits, but this one hurt me. I don't wait for films anymore.

I felt exactly the same about signs, and really loved the village.

I don’t really like the world we’ve built, and I fantasize about leaving it behind. That’s a major reason I lived in the Yukon for years (many people living more like the village than outside it)

These people (the village founders) had an idea and went for it. I really like that.

Signs is the worst movie I’ve ever seen. The plot makes no sense and it’s not like it has good character development or dialogue so that leaves nothing.

I'm a fan of the "aliens are demons" and "the water is holy" (you know, because he's a priest) interpretation.

It's a stretch, but makes the water fit into the story better (in my opinion).

Yep. Signs was the movie that revealed to me my irrational fear of aliens walking in the distance for uncertain purpose.

Not joking, I am a big strong man but I was holding onto my girlfriend and shaking like a leaf during that movie.

Then the water scene happens and ruined the whole movie for me.

But I still get hairs standing up on the back of my neck if I think too long and hard about 7' tall aliens walking sideways in the distance. (Actually getting creeped out just typing this out).

I love it that there is a thought that can disturb me. I don't know where it comes from and I can't exactly control it.

Anyway, same thing with the Village. Great mood. Great cinematography. Great acting. Supernatural horror ominous period piece. So much well crafted build up that ended with an unfunny rehash of the ending of Monty Python's Holy Grail. Total cop out to the rest of the story. Unforgivable.

It was ruined for me because we arrived just as it was about to start, were pointed to the wrong screen, and ended up walking in to a viewing in progress just in time to see enough to make the twist obvious...

As much as I've enjoyed many of Shyamalan's movies, the big problem with them is how much hinges on the twist. To this day I feel very little interest in rewatching them because of that.

Your critique is totally spot on. I can’t stomach Shyamalan’s current movies. Oddly though despite the cheap plot twist and how much it got made fun of in the media at the time, I love The Sixth Sense. I still watch it to this day. The scene where Cole sees the dead biker and tells his mom they’re standing outside the car window? Goosebumps every time.

I think you're right that The Sixth Sense is worth rewatching more so than his later ones.

I cant find the source right now but when Shyamalan wrote the Sixth Sense, it was a complete script on about the fifth draft before he even _thought_ of the twist. And I think thats why its such a great movie. Its like a twist that gives you a whole new movie on top of the perfectly good one you've already seen. And the twist is not just a gimmick, it has emotional depth.

edit: I first saw the sixth sense in perfect conditions - a pirated VCD from Malaysia before any publicity for it had happened in the UK, so had no idea what I was getting myself into other than it had Bruce Willis in it. Absolutely blew me away.

edit: found the source:

According to an interview in Scenario magazine (Volume 5, Number 4), Shyamalan had written five drafts of the screenplay before an idea came to him that transformed it into something totally new, leading to a landmark film with powerful performances from the film’s stars. It happened in the sixth draft.

https://www.stevendeeble.com/2016/05/31/evolution-of-a-scree...

I swear I know this twist from a short story in an English textbook I read in school. Seemingly set in the mid-19th century, a pair of young teens, maybe a group of three, were in the process of exploring outside their village (I think with the intention of leaving for good) -- knowing it’s not allowed by village authorities -- when they walked onto a modern paved road and saw the headlights from a vehicle and didn’t know what they were looking at.

I never watched the movie but from all the conversations I’ve heard about it, it sounds like that’s the twist. This 19th-century village is just a probably slightly cult-y hideaway for some people in modern times. Is that right?

It’s always been the twist.

Variations on the this has been done many times, so I wouldn't be surprised. E.g the broader "protagonist lives in a bubble" theme includes The Truman Show, or Brian Aldiss' novel "Nonstop".

As someone else pointed out part of the problem w/how Shyamalan handles it is that too much hinges on the twist in some of his movies.

> the big problem with them is how much hinges on the twist

I feel similar but different to JJ Abrams' Cloverfield universe. Cloverfield Lane and Cloverfield Paradox are just 2 movies where he attaches a random scene at the end to tie them into the Cloverfield universe. Those scenes have nothing to do with the movie, and if left off would not negatively affect the movie itself.

> Cloverfield Lane and Cloverfield Paradox are just 2 movies where he attaches a random scene at the end to tie them into the Cloverfield universe

That is exactly what it is supposed to be. Think of it like The Twilight Zone, every story is different but they all exist in a world that is distinct and unnatural.

I think JJ Abrams finally came up with a good way of explaining it to people: "It’s like Cloverfield is the amusement park, and each of these movies is a different ride in that park."

It isn't only the twist, though, it's the timing of the twist. Plenty of movies with that kind of twist are re-watchable, but you have to put that twist about ... two-thirds, three-fifths of the way through. The rest of the film is devoted to the protagonist exploring the consequences of realizing that one of their big axioms was wrong. Shyamalan's timing puts the twist at the end, the characters don't really get to react, etc.

I used a lot that movie as an analogy during covid, when we were told that all borders were closed and it was impossible to travel, but the few friends who actually showed up at airports were surprised to see the whole thing functioning normally and be a rather nice experience (no lines). That was 2020 of course. 2021 was a different story.

I had a girlfriend in Denmark and travelled throughout the whole of covid. In Denmark the restrictions weren’t just less they were at different times. Which is the biggest deal because if you move about and the rules are all different they don’t make any sense and hence don’t impose a sense of ordered control. I’d have coffee on the high street in Denmark and then be berated on a train in London the day after by a crazed wild eyed old lady ( who understandably ) had spent the last 6 months or so quarantined in a basement and was cross I was drinking coffee and lowering a mask ( no masks were even required in Denmark that I remember)when I mentioned I had literally been in cafe without a mask the day before it wasn’t a look of annoyance but utter confusion. Understand this was during the height where everything was closed lockdowns extending the darkest moment before the dawn type thing.

The different timing of the rules is what honestly made me not experience the restrictions - just an odd confusion.

Lastly I remember I walked to the airport , told a stewardess in the airport I was going to try fly same day to Denmark and she looked at me like I was insane ( 3 day covid testing required).

I bought a ticket from a machine walked straight into a place with a passport check landed in Denmark - no test. ( when flying to Denmark the test could be done on landing at the airport I have no idea why but it was legal - they just didn’t bother to mostly)

The airport lady wouldn’t have believed it but even to her , working in global field - changing global differences hadn’t registered.

TLDR You CAN have a The Village situation IRL I experienced it!!

For me it’s the kind of movie where if you know there is a twist you can immediately guess what it is.

But I’ve read and watched a lot of thrillers so they tend to become obvious after a while.

On the other hand he also put Usual Suspects on that list (he argues the plot is too complicated). Can't disagree more.

This was Bryce Dallas Howard's first film so it was her big break, before that she had only done theater. Hopefully she got a percentage of the profit and some extra money for promoting the film.

Edit: Also worth noting that her father is Ron Howard so she probably didn't need the money.

Actors get paid for their ability to draw an audience, which largely depends on the success of their previous work. Howard was a nobody, but probaly got paid a lot better for her next movie, since this movie was a success.

Ebert's critique isn't wrong IMO, but I think misses the bigger picture about what did work well in the film

I recently learned that Ebert gave a positive review to Con Air.

And for what con air was, he was right.

From what I have learned about this whole show business / movie business / music business game as played at least in N. America and U.K. (?), the whole thing is pretty rigged and works on a "handshake" basis for the lack of a more loftier term. Hollywood , for the sheer amount of global power it wields, is amazing when you think about how its run like a company town & how little scrutiny it gets overall.

I highly recommend watching the HBO series, Vinyl (2016) about a record executive from the 1970s & the music business then. All those radio hits - that were hit and the ones that werent - you've always scratched your head about make a lot more sense when you understand the inner workings.

[1] Vinyl (2016)

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3186130/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinyl_(TV_series)

Movie goers buy individual tickets which makes a huge difference vs radio. Unpopular movies get booted from theaters very quickly where unpopular songs can stick around on the radio indefinitely.

And it doesn’t matter how connected you are, movie flops quickly kill careers.

Stop this shade throwing at a great work of cinema or the bunny gets it. Con Air is a timeless classic and he was totally right.

Up until Con Air, neither Nicholas Cage nor John Cusack had made a bad movie (well, -maybe- one each).

Up to and including. Right?

ಠ_ಠ

Right?

Criterion Collection material, certainly.

Criterion publishes The Rock and Armageddon, so why not?

He judged high art by the standards of high art, and schlock by the standards of schlock.

A lot of people confuse which one Shayamalan is.

If a movie isn't entertaining, then it's bad. If a movie is at least entertaining, then it's good.

It was also one of the first movies for Jesse Eisenberg, but I cannot find his character (Jamison) in the list. I wonder if it was renamed during shooting. There is a small part for Joseph ($8K total), but there is no character with this name in the final cast.

The pay gap in the star cast is huge for Howard. Was she just starting her career at this point?

Yes, it looks like this was her first or second notable role.

Yeah, sixth film credit… but the second one for which her character had a name.

And that other film appears to have had a box office under $1.4m, with a collection of basically nobody notable attached, including the director.

I laugh at IMDB listings with the heavy (uncredited) listings in people's credits. Why not just tell the truth with listing the credit as Extra?

Probably because "Uncredited" signifies the absence in credits sequence(s) in general for crew and staff, while the term "Extra" applies just to actors.

I’m a simple man too. Ebert is like Punxsutawney Phil to me. He’s right about 30% of the time.

its one of my favorite modern movies. everything is done brillantly and the cinematography is probably shyamalan's best

I enjoyed it also. Memorable and unique.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com