Tuesday, January 23, 2007

"Lady In the Water"

I finally got to see M. Night Shyamalan's latest today. I'm a big fan of his movies, ever since "The Sixth Sense" scared the bejeezes out of me. This one was the usual Shyamalan fare: slow moving plot, lots of silences, interesting camera angles, etc. I LOVED "The Sixth Sense," liked "Unbreakable," thought "Signs" was okay, until they actually showed the alien, which basically ruined it for me (although I did appreciate the twists at the end), and then LOVED "The Village" again.

As far as "Lady In the Water" goes, Paul Giamatti is amazing, as always, and I'm loving that Bryce Dallas Howard (Iris from The Village) is in this too because I just think she's an interesting actress. This movie was different from the others in that it didn't have a major twist or surprise at the end. In my opinion, the theme of this story is that the goofy people, the boring people, the weird or interesting people, the people that you may look right through every day around you--they all have a purpose. There is a meaning for everyone. Everyone has their own little piece of the larger story.

M. Night Shyamalan actually used to tell this to his daughters as a bedtime story, then had a book published, then turned it into a movie.

It took a while to get into it, but by the end, my heart was full, my spirit was soaring. What a weirdly inspirational movie!

2 comments:

Kylene Bak said...

i just want you to know that yesterday i read that you can actually improve your IQ by drinking coffee. just another good reason to keep filling the cup of jo!

joe dimattia said...

tara,
I must agree with your review. if you watch the extras on the dvd you will gain an even greater appreciation for this movie. even though it didn't have the usual surprise twist, it actually did contain some surprises, as the various people involved ended up not being the ones you would expect in the roles you would expect to see them in. showing that every human being really does have an impact on others around him.
the other thing I like about all of shylaman's movies is that they are clean and free of swearing and gratuitous scenes!
that is my mini review. I hope you watched the letterboxed version too! I am a purist, remember?!