Can Sixth Sense director bounce back?

by Tom Brook
BBC News in New York

The director is well-known for films with a twist in the tale

Warning this feature contains plot spoilers

Director M Night Shyamalan will come under intense scrutiny this weekend as Hollywood insiders monitor the box office performance of his new film, a thriller called The Happening.

So far early reviews of The Happening have not been good.

The Hollywood trade paper Variety described the film as "a patchy, uninspired eco-thriller that will likely wilt quickly in the summer heat."

The Los Angeles Times critic was only slightly more charitable describing it as an "elegant but failed creep-fest."

But Manohla Dargis, at the New York Times, enjoyed many aspects of the film. She described it as a "divertingly goofy thriller" with "moments of shivery and twitchy suspense and a solid lead performance from Mark Wahlberg."

International hit

Nine years ago film-maker Shyamalan was revered as Hollywood's new golden boy after supernatural thriller The Sixth Sense became an international hit.

"I see dead people", uttered by a young Haley Joel Osment, has become one of cinema's most quotable lines.

Since the film's breakout success in 1999, the director has made four films but none has been able to match The Sixth Sense in either commercial terms or critical acclaim.

The Happening opens in the UK and US on Friday

Three of his films, Unbreakable, Signs and The Village, all had their fans - but his last film Lady in the Water, a supernatural fantasy involving a mysterious sea nymph in a swimming pool, received an outright drubbing from critics and many moviegoers avoided it.

But the director does not believe, as some have suggested, that his career has been on a downward slide since The Sixth Sense.

"I don't know why people would say that unless they were being very, very mean," he says.

"I think people always need to have a negative slant because if you said 'he's a pretty good guy and he's doing pretty well', that's not worthy of journalism. It has to be you're either going down or you're going up."

Mysterious force

Compared to previous films, Shyamalan appears to have has abandoned some of his trickery and adopted a more straightforward approach with The Happening. Most noticeably there is no surprise ending in the film.

Mark Wahlberg plays a science teacher muddling through with his wife, and a child in their care, when the north-eastern United States comes under attack from a mysterious force.

Victims suddenly stop in their tracks and enter a trance, before killing themselves - sometimes in the most gruesome manner imaginable. One individual decides to bring matters to a close by lying down in front of a lawnmower.

Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel take the lead roles in the new film

In the US The Happening has been given an R rating, meaning that children under 17 unaccompanied by an adult will be unable to see the film. But the rating is being openly embraced by the studio who are using it in their advertising as a means of stimulating audience interest.

At first it's feared that terrorists are responsible for the terrifying events, but eventually it becomes clear that toxins released by plant life are the probable cause.

The message in the film is that the plant world is trying to warn humans that if they don't take care of the planet there will be dire consequences.

As Mark Wahlberg puts it, "it's just like my mother used to tell me about my teeth. If you don't take care of your teeth, your teeth are going to take care of you."

"We've been given this beautiful gift by God, why not nurture it, cherish it, take care of it."

Creative autonomy

Since he made The Sixth Sense, Shyamalan has enjoyed considerable creative autonomy writing and directing films more or less on his own terms.

But if The Happening doesn't perform well at the box office the director may find the big studios are less likely to give him free rein in the future.

And his relationship with Hollywood hasn't been without difficulty.

My job is to make original movies in a mainstream way. M Night Shyamalan

He had a very public parting of the ways with Disney over Lady in the Water, after the studio expressed dissatisfaction with the film's storyline.

Another studio, Warner Brothers, subsequently picked up Lady in the Water, but failed to turn a profit.

The dispute with Disney, revealed with Shyamalan's permission in a tell-all book two years ago, attracted a lot of attention.

But Shyamalan is quick to point out that with his films "every one but one has made an incredible amount of money, so they're very profitable for the studios."

He says, "my job is to make original movies in a mainstream way, and that's what I have been trying to do".

Mark Wahlberg is one of Shyamalan's biggest fans and is quick to support the director: "He’s a dear friend of mine. He's somebody that I have a huge amount of respect for."

"I think that he's one of the real unique visionaries in Hollywood making movies today."