7:30 PM - Alright, so I was fortunate enough to catch M. Night Shyamalan's fifth big film, Lady in the Water. Now I knew going into the film that it would be nothing like his past films, no real horror themes, no real twists; a fairy tale; I told this to the people I went with as well, Marc and Robyn (Sonia couldn't make it). The poster you see on the left isn't the one you normally see everywhere, instead you see Bryce Dallas Howard in some icy cloak or whatever; I felt this poster on the left fits the film much better. Is there any bitterness in my voice? I hope not, cos I really do not want to keep people from watching the film, nor do I want to diss M. Night. Yet, I will tell you my thoughts on this film, hoping that my readers will not take any offense from it, and will instead venture out to the theatres and watch it for themselves. If you do not want to hear about the film, I suggest you do not read the remainder of this "Review" as it reveals a lot about this film, which is conjured up as the film progresses, and since you are not watching the film right at this moment... I hope... it may make your mind wander. And also, if you haven't seen any of M. Night's other films, I suggest you do not read this either, cos I will try to bring back his past in this "Review". So proceed... if you dare... haha.

Right off the bat, this film is definitely nothing like his past films. We have one film where a child sees and speaks to people that have already passed, a film where a man actually learns he is a super hero, a film in which a family discovers that their planet is threatened by aliens who are trying to take over, and finally a film where a group of intelligent to-be parents decide to throw themselves one hundred years into the past in order to keep their children from the disappointment that real life brings. While, at quick glance, all these past films seem quite different; yet if one would watch each of these films entirely, (s)he will see that they are all quite similar: they all have a twist or confusing ending, all rely on characters and their quirks to help other characters out of dangerous situations, all [except Unbreakable] make the audience jump at opportune moments, and very little to no comedic elements are employed throughout any part of the film. That has seemed to be M. Night's niche, yet filmmakers, and people in general, cannot grow without trying new things, and perhaps this was M. Night's venture out of his thriller/scary genre, and for that, I commend him. He took this story that he obviously had a special bond with, as it was a bedtime story he used to tell his kids, and turned it into a film that is nothing like his other films. It employs all of the dozen key characters in the opening scenes of the film very quickly, it does not have a very big twist, it only has one really *scary* moment, it has very many comedic moments, and it's about a damn mermaid... haha, sorry, I had to. The first thing I noticed about this film was how dark it was, not dark as in mysteriously or funny dark, I mean how it was literally too dark. There's a scene where Paul Giamatti's character is standing outside near the pool, and it's almost pitch damn black. And also, in other scenes in the first half, many parts of the screen are just totally out of focus, what photographers would know as "bokeh"... I found that all of these times, it was very unnecessary. Are you telling me that there was absolutely not enough light to fill in the frame that they had to open the aperture larger? It just looked awkward at some points; one such time, I couldn't control my arms and had to lift them up slightly with a confused look, Robyn looked over at me and was just as confused, except her confused was towards my arms, haha. Another thing about the camera, I've noticed in his other films, he has had things that characters look at out of the frame, and the camera would then pan into what the character would be looking at - may it be a flower, a card, or a person - I really liked that, but I don't recall that happening at all in this film. There was quite a few character related thins that bugged me in this film. The Lady, Bryce Dallas Howard, was hardly in this film really, she was just there - hardly any dialogue, I enjoyed her in The Village, but so much in this one. And the only thing that was told at all about any of the characters was that Paul Giamatti's character's family was killed a while ago... and they never went back to it, except for a second when some important tenant brings it up randomly. Another thing that bugged me about this film is M. Night's role. He is basically a pretty big character, he is the sole reason that the Lady in the Water comes to the surface, and she tells him later that it is he who will change the world. But this is probably sounding like total nonsense to you, so I will explain the storyline, which in retrospect somewhat seemed like a comedy that was written for actors to act as they were high (like in the scenes where that dad could read, meaning come up with stories, through the newspaper or his son who could read the cereal boxes).

The opening scene is a cartoon like intro explaining the lives of narfs, underwater nymphs - it tells it all right there, no guesswork needed. These narfs live under water and their purpose in life is to attract a vessel, or a human, that has a strong power, has humans and narfs were friends a while back, but the humans have lost touch with the narfs... or something like that. Narfs are supposed to see this vessel and do something (I don't think it ever really said what the narf has to do)... quite honestly, it was a bit confusing. But it turns out that after the narf finds her vessel, she can then go back to her world (Blue World) after this eagle arrives to take her away. The only thing in her way is this rabid wolf kind of thing called a scrunt. This scrunt is an awesome creature, its back is just like blades of grass and it can lay one hundred percent flat on the ground, so it cannot be seen... and the only way to actually see it is through a mirror - you see its red eyes like an alligator staring back at you and the only thing that can stop these scrunts (there is only one in this story) are these monkey things that hide in trees. There are also specific people that live around the vessel, people that do not know that they are those people, those include the guardian, a bunch of sisters and two companions, a healer, all of whom live in the apartment building. So that's the main plot, find these people from the apartment building, and get the girl back to her home, why this is all happening is the major confusing part. And how do these people know of this, the whole people instance and the animals? Because it is a real life eastern fairy tale that a tenant, who lives with her daughter who goes to a nearby Philadelphia university, used to hear it from her mother; the only problem is that she cannot speak English at all, and the daughter is forced to be the interpreter.

So that's basically the film, they gather up these people to help this girl go back to her home... no one knows why she is really there, nor why they are helping her, and they all do it willingly. I guess M. Night is trying to say that everyone should help each other, or something like that, I don't know. All I do know is that I like the characters of this film, from the guy who only works out the right side of his body, as a kind of experiment; the group of guys that live in apartment 12A (or something like that) who smoke and talk about mundane things (they were freaking hilarious! Reminded me of Seinfeld I guess.), and the critic who just moves in and acts as if he knows about everything (which is where the mini twist comes in, and which is why something bad happens to him); but I do not like the story too much, it just seems that there is so much there that M. Night had to condense so much and fit it into a two hour film - it seems much better if were a book (which it is by the way) or, like an IMDb poster stated, a mini-series. I also think that M. Night should focus less on actually writing the screenplay and more on the characters, basic storyline, directing, and producing. For example, in the The Village, I fell in love with all the main characters - I fell in love with those characters and that story so much that I actually became quite depressed after the film ended, only maybe two other films have actually done that to me. But, that ending of The Village really got to me, not that "Lucius, I am here", but that whole actually being in the twentieth century - I don't clearly see why that had to be added at all, why couldn't it be all about a film where the characters are all set in the late 1800s, there are supposed creatures in the forest, and there is a real town outside the forest... but I guess he felt a twist must be added, and that is where I don't agree - I don't think a twist is absolutely necessary. So, I think M. Night should stick with directing and producing, as well as having a large control over the writing, but not so much as his past films, as sad as that may sound cos I know I'd be very upset if someone told me that my writing sucked - Manoj, we love you're directing, and we love your jumps; we also admire your jump into something different, but in time, come back to your heart pumping thrillers with intensely vivid, loving characters... without the need for a twist, please - but of course, it's up to you, haha. My hat's off to M. Night for this production, but it just wasn't for me, but don't take my word for it (nor the eight or something people that walked out in our showing), do what I always say and catch it yourself.

I am also adding "Sunny" in time, Insha Allah - they are encoding now - as I've been busy with this M. Night business to devote my full time to "Sunny". Oh, and I bought that 500GB hard drive I wanted, yesterday, for about $280 from PCConnection. Check my "I Want List" for more details on that and other things I hope to buy, Insha Allah. I plan next to get that Canon 430EX from B&H this weekend, Insha Allah - if you haven't noticed, I got paid recently and am buying things left and right - but after this weekend, I will only have about $62 in my bank account... wow, haha. And those two things I need - the hard drive, for this damn site, and the flash for my camera (cos I need it for work). And guys, my VoIP is officially working and I hard-wired it to work through the house - I'm going to update my network diagram and show it to you guys later, Insha Allah - it's a hoot! Okay, that's all for me. Take care everyone. see u.