WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!I absolutely love M. Night Shyamalan’s work as a director and a writer. His films have all been intriguing and well made, so I was dismayed when I heard so much negative press about this film. The critical consensus was that Lady in the Water was a dud and an ‘exercise in arrogance and self-indulgence’ on Shyamalan’s part. I went into this film with mixed feelings, hoping that one of the more brilliant filmmakers of our time hadn’t truly blown it.
Fortunately, he hasn’t. I can see why people may not have been impressed with Lady in the Water, as it is a departure from Shyamalan’s twist ending thrill fests. Yet I see no reason for the critics and moviegoers to slam the director in the way they did. It seems to me that most critics responded with viciousness to Shyamalan’s depiction of a film critic character as a cold, unfeeling jerk who thinks he knows everything. It was tongue-in-cheek and I got a good laugh out of it, because it is in fact largely true. Film critics, for the most part, do not live in this plane of reality. Something about film school and “proper training” ups the ego on some of these folks, and it is apparent that many of them couldn’t take a joke.
As for the movie, it isn’t as good as any of Shyamalan’s previous major releases (though I have yet to watch Unbreakable). That much is true. But it’s not bad, and I shudder to declare it Shyamalan’s worst film. I look at it as his weakest film, because I still enjoyed it. It’s based off of a bedtime story Shyamalan wrote for his children, but this version is more detailed and more frightening than the bedtime version.
As it is based off a bedtime story, intended for children, Shyamalan takes a unique approach by moving the players and events of the story in the same manner of innocence, naïveté and simplicity that story book characters always possess. This means that the viewer has to figure out that they should be approaching Lady in the Water with a sort of childlike view, hearkening back to the fairy tales and Disney movies that filled our younger days. It’s challenging, because people are used to these kinds of stories being animated kid stuff. The live action adult actors and PG-13 setting makes you want to assume it’s supposed to be a standard-issue thriller. However, if you are able to put yourself into the proper and intended mindset, you will get this film.
So I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to see how many people are incapable of thinking like a kid again, now that the current generation of computer animated “kids” films incorporates adult humor so the parents don’t have to think like a kid again to enjoy it. It’s really kind of sad. The story is about a water nymph who is on a mission to meet someone, but whom exactly she does not know. Once meeting this person their life will change and they accomplish great things, leading to future restoration of the long-severed ties between human and water nymphs. The nymph in question happens upon a troubled apartment superintendent. He and eventually many of the folk living in the apartment complex end up being players in the puzzle to allow the nymph to accomplish her task and return home.
Shyamalan took heat from critics because he plays the important character the nymph is supposed to meet. I thought he was fine in the part, because while the character is important in the grand scheme of things beyond the end of the film, he doesn’t really do much during the course of the film. Shyamalan wouldn’t have been a fit for any of the other supporting cast and it makes sense for him to play a struggling writer trying to make sense of his place in the world. Critics just need to lighten up.
The visuals are decent, though there is some not-so-good-looking CGI involved. The biggest problem is that the action is all confined to one set piece- the apartment complex. We’re trapped there, and never get the sense that there is a world outside of this one, but that is also part of the storybook nature of it all. When all is said and done, my appreciation for Shyamalan is still strong. With Lady in the Water he dares to be different. While many critics and moviegoers couldn’t appreciate his craft, I could.
RATING: 3.25 out of 5
