the visit

[ShadowDog]

That may be your point but its not Driver's point. His point is suspending your disbelief shouldn't be work. It should be effortless. You're thinking in absolutes, which is fine, but not what he means.

[Jedigoat]

You don't have to talk about suspension of disbelief for it to still be there.

The criticism of aliens coming here, despite all the water, fails because what other planet are they going to go to? Seriously, where? There's no where else to go. And if you lock an alien in a room what makes you think it can get out? Technology? Ok

Great. But the alien didn't have the technology with it.

I understand the criticism but I don't think it's justifiable. Again, if it was the primary plot it would stand to be criticized. The alien invasion only really serves to bring the family together and restore Mel's faith. I think the script and film did a good job of this.

[Driver]

Yeah-- Shadow Dog gets what I am saying.

 

Suspension of disbelief comes into play when the movie breaks its own rules. If the first act says, hey-- this elephant can fly, then this elephant can fly. If the set up tells us aliens can travel across the stars and want out planet-- then cool, fine. But I'm supposed to think they don't know why have an abundance of what kills them?

 

You're saying they have spaceships, but not raincoats? That they didn't look at our weather patterns before landing? Okay, so Earth is the only planet they can come to (which in itself is an assumption since the story never told us one way or another) that still doesn't excuse poor planning that defies any sort of explanation.

 

What we see them do (fly across space, make giant symbols in the ground, appear places) does not jive with what they can't do (open a locked door than any adult man could kick in, have an umbrella, not wear tinfoil, etc).

 

Another lesson I live by-- is if you don't want the audience asking questions, don't hand it to them.

 

If any of these things had an explanation, it could have been given to us some how.

 

This is like the whole SUPERMAN HAD TO KILL ZOD HE HAD NO CHOICE argument- Bull, the writers put him in that situation when they didn't have to.

 

An alien invasion movie where we have a limited point of view, and stick close to one family? Awesome. I'm in. Aliens are ALIEN their shit may not make sense to us-- that's also cool. But there has to be some set of rules or framework of logic.

 

I can maybe excuse the locked door. But the water thing? That's just stupid and I'll never be convinced otherwise.

[Jacen123]

Man, who would have guessed that a thread about a Shyamalan movie would end up being about how to successfully screenwrite?

[Jedigoat]

Ha! Cool. It works for me but I get that it won't for some. I think it's kinda nitpicky.

I think in the MOS, the Zod getting killed part was lame too but from the writer's POV, I get what they were trying to do with that. I doesn't work and they should have found a better situation for Supes to be forced to kill Zod.

Back to Shyamalan real quick....I love his concepts. They may not play out perfectly, but I enjoy them because I like his ideas. I guess sometimes they should be fleshed out more, like the Happening. It may not have worked as a whole, but I love the what if concept of hey what if we treated mother nature like shit for so long, it got tired of it and developed a defense mechanism? Such a great idea! Great concept, not fleshed out properly....story of M. Night's career.

[Driver]

Night had the same problem that Lucas and Cameron and Nolan have. He was at a place where no one could tell him "No-- you should rethink that."

[Jacen123]

I do plan on seeing this movie at some point, though I may wait until blu-ray for this. That's more just because I'm busy this time of the year, though. The only movies of Shyamalan's that I haven't seen are The Last Airbender and AfterEarth. Besides the fact that it was apparently terrible, I have no real interest in the Avatar series. AfterEarth, while I have also heard terrible things about it seems like the type of movie I would watch when it comes on HBO or Netflix. The only movie of his that I outright disliked/hated was Lady in the Water. I'm not saying that The Happening was good, but after hearing so many terrible things about it, it wasn't as bad as I expected and I got some chuckles in along the way.

[Jedigoat]

I think M. Nights films wouldn't be looked at so poorly if they didn't have such high expectations. Such high expectations leading up to the Village....everyone was so pissed off after seeing it....lol. It wasn't that bad! I enjoyed it. Again, I get the frustration people have. It's the misdirection in the promotion of the film. You're expecting one thing, you get something else, everyone gets angry!

[Jacen123]

Yeah-- Shadow Dog gets what I am saying.

 

Suspension of disbelief comes into play when the movie breaks its own rules. If the first act says, hey-- this elephant can fly, then this elephant can fly. If the set up tells us aliens can travel across the stars and want out planet-- then cool, fine. But I'm supposed to think they don't know why have an abundance of what kills them?

 

You're saying they have spaceships, but not raincoats? That they didn't look at our weather patterns before landing? Okay, so Earth is the only planet they can come to (which in itself is an assumption since the story never told us one way or another) that still doesn't excuse poor planning that defies any sort of explanation.

 

What we see them do (fly across space, make giant symbols in the ground, appear places) does not jive with what they can't do (open a locked door than any adult man could kick in, have an umbrella, not wear tinfoil, etc).

 

Another lesson I live by-- is if you don't want the audience asking questions, don't hand it to them.

 

If any of these things had an explanation, it could have been given to us some how.

 

This is like the whole SUPERMAN HAD TO KILL ZOD HE HAD NO CHOICE argument- Bull, the writers put him in that situation when they didn't have to.

 

An alien invasion movie where we have a limited point of view, and stick close to one family? Awesome. I'm in. Aliens are ALIEN their **** may not make sense to us-- that's also cool. But there has to be some set of rules or framework of logic.

 

I can maybe excuse the locked door. But the water thing? That's just stupid and I'll never be convinced otherwise.

I'm not saying this to refute you or anything, but ever since I first saw it, I've really liked the fan theory that the aliens are actually demons. Not that he was going for that, but I think it makes it make Signs work better.

[ShadowDog]

One rule I live by as a writer is this: even if you don't answer every question in a movie you should HAVE every answer. One of my scripts is about a future alien invasion that wipes out life on earth so the last few humans use time travel to recruit people from the past to help them fight. The first draft was 120 pages because I answered every question the audience could possibly have. (why didn't we notice people disappearing through history? We did! Remember the Roanoke colony? ... Why didn't taking people from the past change history? They only took people history already said disappeared)

 

The answers were awesome. The audience would have walked out with zero questions. But the pace was glacial. So I had to cut most of it. But I had the answers if challenged and the script was written with the answers in mind so I gotta believe some of that forethought seeped in here and there.

 

You never get the feeling an M Night script was written by someone who has thought of every question and answered it.

[Jedigoat]

Ehhhhhh...I still disagree. I've written scripts back in school and a few afterwards, so I usually approach most films I watch with the viewpoint of a writer or a director. You gotta have detailed backstory on everything. Or should, anyway.

I still argue that the aliens come to Earth out of some type of necessity or else why would they be here. They got here, realized it wasn't worth the risk, and they left. Works for me. I use to play baseball so my biggest gripe is the way Mr. Phoenix holds his baseball bat! He's a professional baseball player, you don't stand like that!! Worse than water problems!

[Driver]

If it works for you, that's great. But you have to recognize that you are in a huge minority. Which again, is cool-- but you're not going to get far when Signs was the movie that stopped Nights previous career trajectory and made the budgets of his significantly lower.

[Driver]

And come on, you telling me you wrote some scripts once is like me telling you I lanced a boil on a friend once so I know from Doctoring!

[Jedigoat]

Lol....back atcha, buddy!

[Jedigoat]

Tank, I suppose you may know better, but I would say the Village is what made Night lose cred. Not Signs. Signs made almost as much as the 6th Sense!

[Driver]

Signs stopped big studios from giving him blank checks-- but the one that really killed him was the lady in the swimming pool one.

[ShadowDog]

Yeah it was an ugly run there: Signs, The Village, The Lady In The Water. Dealer's choice which one was most horrid. But that's kinda like debating which of your 3 fingers to be cut off with a rusty dull hacksaw hurt the worst.

[Jedigoat]

Lady in the Water or the Happening. Those two fell flat on their faces. Never saw Airbender. After Earth sucked. Again, I liked the concept, just not the execution so much.

[Guest]

The first 2/3 of The Village was good.

[Driver]

Agreed. I actually kind a liked it. But I also always confuse it with that French Kung Fu movie about the dudes fighting a monster attacking a village and the monster is actually a tiger in armor. I don't remember what it was called.

[Guest]

It wasn't bad, but I felt cheated by the twist. It was a matter of being trapped into that and the audience expecting it.

Had it come from someone else, I feel like it would have been far better. Instead I spent the whole film thinking "I hope the twist isn't that they're living this way separated from the modern world."

[Metropolis]

 

I use to play baseball so my biggest gripe is the way Mr. Phoenix holds his baseball bat! He's a professional baseball player, you don't stand like that!! Worse than water problems!

Well he did hold the record for most strike outs as well. Stance and swing have a lot to do with that. Plus he was swinging atba target that wasn't belt high.

[Jedigoat]

Well if you're gonna pose before you strike an alien, at least get your footing right! It's the long pauses that he makes that crack me up. He had to get into swinging position as if he's in a game. All you have to do is beat down an alien. Lol

The other thing that bugged me was Mel's wife being pinned in front of the wrecked truck. I've heard of this happening but it just seems odd to me. The emergency responders just leave her pinned in front of a truck, knowing just by looking at her she will die if they move her??

[Driver]

Agreed. I actually kind a liked it. But I also always confuse it with that French Kung Fu movie about the dudes fighting a monster attacking a village and the monster is actually a tiger in armor. I don't remember what it was called.

Brotherhood of the Wolf.

That was killing me.