Tuesday, May 22, 2007
All Those Neighbors
Having a cross section of recognizable social types also had promise. Since the movie never left the apartment complex, it made it seem like a little village. But although the movie was plenty long, these characters seemed underdeveloped. They needed the help of somebody who can do quick character sketches in just a few scenes to give a bit of depth to this large cast.
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12 comments:
I thought the cast was pretty large, and with a large cast (especially a diverse cast), I tend to forgive a lack of depth. Having that many characters with a lot of depth would be asking too much of the audience, in my opinion. I would be unable to get my head around it all.
I agree that the characters, with the exception of Giamatti's, never moved beyond "types."
And I don't think the self-conscious-movie-reference "wit" salvaged that.
And what was with the little boy? (I knew something was up with that kid when he was making philosophical observations on the cereal boxes, although I did not guess that he would be the Interpreter). I found the idea of the "special" child a little hackneyed. I should have known from the little boy in "Sixth Sense," though, that Shyamalan has an affinity for the wunderkind.
It seemed kind of obvious to me from the beginning that the characters were going to be "types," so it didn't really bother me. It seemed intentional.
Yeah, that's a good point.
He could have done something more interesting with the types, though.
Ha ... ditto on KC's comments about the "special" child. A little boy who talks with dead people is an audience-grabber. A little boy who talks to Cap'n Crunch is ridiculous.
I thought Shyamalan and the woman who played his sister had a nice and reasonably developed storyline (perhaps at the expense of the author/healer, the apartment loner, the lopsided bodybuilder ...).
And Erin, I loved that critic.
Christy, apparently a lot of film critics loved the critic, or at least sympathized with him, because they saw him as Shyamalan's "pre-emptive strike" at all the critics who would badmouth his movie.
From Roger Ebert:
In the end, Shyamalan takes his fantasy revenge against those damnable critics who try to explain everything in terms of archetypes and clichés by attacking his modular critic with an archetypal cliché. Having seen his share of hackneyed horror films, Mr. Farber describes and critiques his own (predictable) final scene in the film even as it is taking place. And, like Giamatti, Balaban is so good he almost pulls it off.
But honestly, the movie doesn't give Mr. Farber enough credit. Shyamalan told S.T. VanAirsdale at The Reeler: "Well, the movie is about storytelling. And so, you know, the idea's about honoring storytelling again and giving it reverence. And this particular guy [Mr. Farber] who thinks he's an expert on it is leading people in the wrong way."
In truth, that's not what happens at all. Mr. Heep asks the critic's advice (without telling him why) about storytelling conventions to help him identify what kinds of people might conform to the roles in the bedtime story. When things go wrong, Mr. Farber gets the blame. (“What kind of person would be so arrogant as to presume the intention of another human being?" exclaims an outraged tenant. I don't know. A screenwriter, maybe?) But the movie ends up confirming that the critic was right all along. Mr. Heep has, in fact, misinterpreted the perfectly sound information Mr. Farber has given him, without which there would be no happy ending. (Doesn't that, in fact make Heep the real critic -- the Misinterpreter?)
So, I'm going to stand up for Mr. Farber. Because he's funnier and a more vivid presence than anything else in the patchwork story Shyamalan has cobbled together, you feel the movie couldn't even exist if he weren't there to ridicule it. If a fairy tale fails in the forest and there's nobody there to criticize it, does it make any sense? Sadly, even Mr. Farber couldn't decipher this mess.
Oh, thanks for sharing kc. I like that.
I thought the critic's presence was more self-referential than Shyamalan's. I loved it: As a know-it-all critic who doesn't believe in originality, I have faith that I will live through this encounter.
And then he's slaughtered.
See, though, I saw the slaughter coming from a mile away. I think it would have been funnier, and way less predictable, if he managed, after his know-it-all movie critic speech, to escape the scrunt's attack by a hair's breadth — so close that we think he's a sure goner — and then he could whip around and say "told you so!"
Then as he is smugly walking back to his room he could be smote by an anvil accidentally knocked off a window ledge.
Who's with me on this?
I also liked the critic a lot and the role was well cast. But I’m with kc that I spotted the big munch like it was tattooed on his forehead. And he was wrong with his final lines: the monster always kills the minor characters. You got to be on the marquee if you hope to escape.
One way the film could have been better would have been to have more snark and less sap. Playing up self-conscious self-reference in a obviously deliberate cycle could have made this into an effective comedy although a lot of films have been trying this in the last decade or so.
Try this:
The critic pontificates about how minor characters like his get killed and goes on to manly proclaim that he is ready to “take a hit for the good of the movie” only to have the grass dog get distract and run off chasing that lady’s cat down the hall.
I thought the kid that could read great and deep truths off of cereal boxes was one of the better touches. It showed how silly the idea of “reading signs” really is without being heavy handed. And I thought it was funny when he came in and apologized for misreading the box. But then, don’t all revealed religions have a few problems with “misreading the box”?
Ooh, I like the kitty distraction idea.
And good call on "misreading the box."
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