Shyamalan is technically a superb film-maker, for all that he's picked up most of his tricks from Spielberg and Hitchcock.
Comment
06/24/06
Signs (2002)
74 %
Reviews Counted: 216 Fresh: 159 Rotten:57 Average Rating: 6.8/10
Consensus:
With Signs, Shyamalan proves once again an expert at building suspense and giving audiences the chills.
Runtime: 1 hr 46 mins
Synopsis: It's contaminated. That's what pint-sized Bo (Abigail Breslin) says about every glass of water that she tries to drink, then rejects. This is just one in a long list of strange occurrences that are changing the lives of the Hess family. Things go awry when Graham Hess (Mel Gibson) and his... [More]
Genre: Horror/Suspense
Starring: Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix, Rory Culkin, Abigail Breslin, Cherry Jones
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Screenwriter: M. Night Shyamalan
Producer: Frank Marshall, Sam Mercer
Composer: James Newton Howard
Screenwriter: M. Night Shyamalan
Producer: Frank Marshall, Sam Mercer
Composer: James Newton Howard
Reviews
Top Critic
For the most part, the script is extremely well written, allowing each character to shine and developing some interesting ideas. It is also, frequently, very funny.
10/30/02
The work of a filmmaker who has secrets buried at the heart of his story and knows how to take time revealing them. Strange occurrences build in the mind of the viewer and take on extreme urgency.
10/06/02
This talented and, at 32, very young director must now find new ideas -- maybe working with someone else's scripts. Because his film-making identity is in danger of fading.
10/02/02
Top Critic
A terrific suspense movie, overlaid with a faintly embarrassing tale of faith lost and perhaps regained.
10/02/02
Shyamalan continues his run of moody, skilfully-constructed pictures. Pity about plot weaknesses and the pretentious dialogue.
09/17/02
Gibson is on top form, and there are some genuinely terrifying moments that will have you cowering behind your popcorn.
08/26/02
Top Critic
Without ever touching on a cliche (except to poke fun at it), Shyamalan skillfully builds the film on several layers -- personal redemption, family drama, community-in-crisis, world on the brink.
08/08/02
An anti-Independence Day, a cousin of Close Encounters, but most of all, a well-modulated, dread-laden, faith-based mystery. [Blu-Ray]
06/01/08
Individual sequences generate an eerie tension that's always deflated, creating a jarring stop-and-go rhythm, and the atmospheric trickery never strays beyond a lot of smoke and mirrors.
06/06/07
I come away from Signs exhilarated by Shyamalan's skill at keeping his audience guessing.
12/06/04
The one good thing about it is that it’s over in one hour and 47 minutes. The bad thing is to think what a terrible waste it was of an hour and 47 minutes.
10/07/04
A gripping and well-made thriller that preserves Shyamalan’s winning streak and shows us, as all the best films do, a world that we’re familiar with and believe in, and yet we’ve never seen, and by which we’re endlessly fascinated.
02/01/04
Shyamalan fancies himself a philosopher whose stories have deep and important meanings that need to be conveyed to audiences as slowly and heavy-handedly as possible.
01/01/04
One may never get the answer that they seek, but they will be scared out of the wits when searching for one.
05/13/03
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