Breaking in M. Night Shyamalan | A cultural phenomenon
- 01/11/2023
The highly successful director, writer and producer first entered the cultural zeitgeist in 1999 with the Oscar-nominated `The Sixth Sense` starring Bruce Willis. The movie instantly became a global phenomenon and is up there with Fight Club or The Matrix. The “I see dead people” lives in our memory next to “You don’t talk about fight club”. But in this article, we ARE going to talk about the Night club.
Night Shyamalan (Sha-mah-lahn) makes a new movie every two years. Given his endless stream of creativity and success, you may think that he’s a perfect fit for Hollywood. How can he not be? Night’s movies are almost guaranteed to be box office hits. The Sixt Sense has a lifetime gross of $672 million, made on a budget of $40 million. But after some unfavorable experiences with the studios, Night found out he did not get along with their expectations. He decided to go back to his independent film-maker roots. Starting with 2015, he took a big risk and self-financed his movies, and even put his home up for a loan to raise the budget.
Some artists run away from external input so they can create their true vision. And they end up making lengthy movies that, unfortunately, come out gloomy and esoteric. Because those movies are unpleasant experiences for other human beings, they don’t make money. Those artists actually needed limitations to nudge them back towards the real world, where commercial viability is important because it enables them to make other cool stuff in the future. Commercial viability is also an important motivator that helps them aim for a common vocabulary with the audience, so that they can understand and enjoy the work.
His risky choice to self-finance proved right. Instead of making something gloomy and esoteric, Night’s self-financed movie is a straightforward thriller called The Visit (2015). And his artistic vision matched the cultural zeitgeist’s taste in entertainment, as it did with previous hits. With a self-financed budget of $5 million, `The Visit` made $98 million worldwide, reminding everybody that he’s the real deal. After `The Visit`, he created Split (2016) for $9 million, earning $278 million worldwide. As of 2023, Night started a new collaboration with Warner Bros. But little is known about the deal, if they will only distribute the movies or will also finance Night’s projects.
Seeing signs and porcupine monks
I discovered Night on HBO when I was about 12 and distinctly remember Signs (2002) as a very special movie experience. How could an invasion movie play out like a family drama, barely show the aliens, and still be so interesting? It just felt and looked like a `good movie`. Something about it was lifelike and grounded. The setting was relatable: a farmhouse in a cornfield. The characters were wholesome, and the protagonist did not have skills that perfectly matched the danger. He was not an ex-military alien expert, but an ex-priest. Everything about the movie felt slightly off-tempo, in a good way. But it was still Hollywood. It did not cross the line into a talky, boring, existential movie. It was very scary and very fun. And I did not know that what I was experiencing was an author’s vision.
Night plays around with expectations not only in the story but in what a movie is supposed to be. In Signs, the alien invasion is secondary and plays out as complementary to the family drama. And in Unbreakable (2000), the super-hero story is secondary to the broken marriage. Night’s movies give you a strong sense of grounded reality and most of his movies have domestic themes like losing your loved one, going through a rough marriage or spending time with grandparents. And this domestic realm seems to be Night’s most comfortable narrative workspace. Night creates relatable characters with everyday problems. And that reality becomes a baseline for what is normal. The thriller or horror elements that later come into play hit way harder, because of that baseline reality. Your are watching it as a family drama and all of a sudden there are porcupine monks or invisible aliens terrorizing the characters.
The hand painting the painting and tension out of thin air
Regarding Night’s style, sometimes his movies have an european vibe – moody, liminal and the camera movement used as a narrative tool. And sometimes the movies are descriptive, with a style-less style where the camera is there to objectively document. One recurring stylistical choice is the slow pacing and offbeat editing. Night creates long and unpredictable scenes that cut a little later than expected, and that creates a sense of both tension and realism. These longer scenes are common in european movies where authors are mesmerized by some truth that reveals itself when putting emphasis on nothing in particular. But Night never goes full-arthouse, he keeps the movies accessible.
Night also enjoys meta narratives. In `Unbreakable` the main characters talk about how the story should unfold. David Dunn (Bruce Willis) is told what his hero’s journey should be, and the movie is about him accepting that meta narrative. Unbreakable, Glass, Lady in the Water, and The Visit all feature meta storytelling devices. Meta can make or break a movie, but Night is never fully challenging the medium in a `What is a movie, really?` kind of way. And more often he lightheartedly inserts the meta elements and it just looks like he had fun while writing them, like he was aiming to innovate, not deconstruct the medium.
And `fun` is a good word to describe Night’s movies. All of his movies are sprinkled with comedy. Even the most nightmare-realm stories have funny moments in them. There is a scene in The Village where one character is theatrically conveying her love to Lucius (Joaquin Phoenix) in a long monologue. Before he gets to answer, it cuts to her crying. A similar moment is in The Visit where two siblings, Becca (Olivia DeJonge) and Tyler (Ed Oxenbould), visit their grandparents. The sister considers cinematography a respectable artistic medium and he should only document important moments. She tells him that cinema is a respectable artistic medium and he should ‘try to be formal, as in classicism’ and before she finishes the sentence the movie cuts to the first thing he filmed: making silly faces into the camera.
Where is Night, culturally speaking
With a career spanning three decades, his recent movies like `Old` or `Knock at The Cabin` show that Night knows exactly what he wants to create. They are clinically precise and there aren’t any signs of him slowing down in any way. On the contrary, his popularity is only going up in recent years, and he is even extending his creativity to TV shows, like Apple TV+`The Servant`.
As an exercise to position him in a larger cultural context, his interest for meta can be compared to Charlie Kaufman. They both enjoy writing stories about authors writing stories. Kaufman’s `Adaptation` can be compared to `Lady in The Water` and even ‘Unbreakable`. Regarding Night’s large body of work and his interest to inovate the thriller genre – while also terrifying the audience – Alfred Hitchcock can be a reference to visualize Night’s career as a whole. Similarities between them exist both in the sheer endless creativity and eclectic story picks. And finally, for the interest in human-centric stories and the talent to create relatable characters and accurately portray families on screen, Steven Spielberg also comes to mind.
Night is often portrayed in media as `the twist ending` director. And that shows where Night made his cultural mark. But if used as a critique, it’s like saying `I bet Wes Anderson’s movie will be colorful and quirky`. Right before the twist ending there was also a great movie that got you to that point.
Further reading:
M. Night Talking About Self-Financing His Movies – Tweet
Will M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘Knock at the Cabin’ Dethrone ‘Avatar 2’ From No. 1 at the Box Office?
M. Night Shyamalan Says He Has Experienced Hollywood Highs and Lows So Many Times
