So I was reading EW today...

[sgt_angua4]

So there was a small article in last weeks Entertainment Weekly that was essentially asking why the quality of M. Knight Shyamalan movies declined over the years. When I opened this weeks new issue, there was a letter to the editor about the article. Italics are mine.

"After reading "What Happened to M. Knight Shyamalan (DVD & Downloads), I feel I

Comments

[dietotaku]

lol! i think we ALL came to that conclusion. XD

i'm certain there are still a few people who are just so invested in being fans of m night and/or the series that they are simply incapable of perceiving bad things about them. everything passes through this filter that says "it's shyamalan/atla, therefore i love it." because yes, the public's perception of shyamalan has changed. it has changed as a direct result of his increasingly bad movies. people didn't just decide to hate shyamalan for no reason, it is the fact that each of his movies is worse than the previous one. they are bad movies from an objective, technical standpoint. if you submitted them to a film school professor he would give you an F.

it's not that he's some passing fad the public just got sick of, it's that each movie he makes shows us more clearly what his strengths and weaknesses are. MANY of his movies have made it clear that HE IS NOT A WRITER. he sucks at writing. the dialogue sucks, the plot is stupid, and he keeps giving himself increasingly ridiculous cameos. TLA proved, in addition to that, that he is not an action movie director. he has no sense of pacing or emotion for that genre. the stoic, tense and serious thing works fine for suspense thrillers but not adventure epics. especially not an adventure epic with such an ingrained comedic aspect like ATLA.

[lightbird777]

i'm certain there are still a few people who are just so invested in being fans of m night and/or the series that they are simply incapable of perceiving bad things about them.

Yep, that's what it's about. All fans of anyone/anything do the same thing, so this isn't surprising.

Admittedly I've only seen two of Shyamalan's movies, so I can't judge his whole body of work. I liked The Sixth Sense. Some fans I've spoken to (people who like him and his work but are not in denial/afraid to call him out if he does something crappy) have said that he's a better writer than director. Maybe if he stuck to writing and let someone else direct his stuff it would be better? IDK. Like I said, I've only seen two of his movies. The Sixth Sense was one of them, and TLA was the other. His other movies aside TLA was a pile of shit in every way. And regarding the letter? Everyone else has already said what I think, lol.

[dietotaku]

if shyamalan used to be a good writer, he isn't anymore. i haven't seen all of his movies but i did see signs and the happening, and there was a visible decline in the writing between those 2. signs was alright, not fantastic, but not painful. the happening was awful on a legendary scale, surpassed only by TLA. even if you just look at the basic idea behind each of his movies, you can see them just getting dumber and dumber. you go from a guy who doesn't know he's dead and a modern superhero story to aliens that are allergic to water (and yet try to invade a planet made of 75% water), killer trees and "6 people are trapped in an elevator and one of them is the devil." if anything i'd say the opposite - that he's a better director than writer - so long as he's working in his own genre niche. he can shoot a suspenseful movie, there's no question about that. but for god's sake stop letting him write and direct adventure epics. D: