Back to Back Rhymin - 3 Feet High and Risin' - Ep 1

Spark: M. Night Shyamalan's Signs: cinematic sublimity or egregiously trite pap? I've always been of the opinion of the former, but I watched it again today, and I have to admit that it's lost the teeniest bit of its lustre for me. Maybe it's Shyamalan's 2 follow-up disappointments that have tainted it, or perhaps its what Mel Said, but I'm starting to see flaws previously unnoticed. And I've always been able to get around the stupidity of the "aliens invading Earth when their major weakness is water" plot hole (wouldn't the water vapor in the air alone harm them?), so that's saying something.

Denz: I first saw Signs, well the first 30 minutes anyway, on a bootlegged CAM dvd that I picked up from some toothless gent in BKK. Something about the CAM quality made it strangely compelling, but pretty much unwatchable. If anything, it acted as a bit of a teaser for me (much in the same way Cloverfield has for generation iPhone -- I am a pioneer, after all). I was hyped to see the real deal in cinemascope. I'm sure you'd agree that Signs was definitely a film that had to be experienced in the cinema. Watched on the big screen it was spooky as fuck. Even the opening credits/music were genius.

One thought occurred to me when I watched the film. If sci-fi/horror movies had continued on the same basic path of 40s and 50s cinema, Signs is what such a movie would have looked like in 2000. Unfortunately, the 70s and 80s altered sci-fi/horror forever. To me, Signs was a sci-fi throwback jersey. And a polished one at that.

I don't understand the Shyamalan hate. The man makes beautiful cine. I haven't seen The Village, but I have seen The Lady in the Water. I'm sure Lady probably fuelled the hate, but to me it was a great story (and fun). And that's just it, really. Shyamalan makes simple and beautiful movies. A ghost story (Sixth), a comic book (Unbreakable), an alien movie (Signs) and a fairytale (Lady). I wonder if people will come around. Doubtful, people are idiots (see iPhone).

I understand that it might be losing some of its gloss, particularly because Gibson is becoming as painful to watch retrospectively as Thomas Cruise, but don't be too hard on the old joint. Most things fall apart after repeated viewings. Look at Britney.

As for plotholes, put it this way: the aliens probably didn't have much to choose from in terms of habitable planets, and Earth was probably it. This isn't without precedent. Remember Alien Nation? The sea was battery acid to those coneheads, yet they came here.

Actually, now that I think about it, there is a more plausible explanation. Interstellar migration is probably handled by the alien's equivalent bureaucracy, right? I'm sure the initial policy was well conceived, probably at a cabinet level, but the execution would have been handled by low-level clerks and mid-management at the agency level. The water thing was probably overlooked by some underpaid alien in a cardigan. Errors like that are never going to be identified until the policy is implemented (military incursion), and by then it's too late (because the army is stupid). Explains it all, really.

Fuzon (Kmart): I cast my vote for Signs as 'egregiously trite pap', if only because because Zel claimed that the augmentation of the sci-fi/horror genre, caused by the 70s and 80s, was an unfortunate situation. Yeah, Dawn of the Dead was terrible, and let's not forget the remake of the Thing. What the fuck was Carpenter thinking? Long live the bald, deformed man that besieged the hapless scientists of the original.

I know that some folks prefer their aliens with down syndrome and an aversion to water, but I'll stick to things that are actually, at least mildly, frightening.

Denz: Oh, K-mart.
So, Spark, where do you stand on Unbreakable? I am yet to meet anyone who thinks it is a brilliant film? Is it one of his better films, or am I a rampaging fanboy?

Spark: Oh, Unbreakable is unquestionably Shyamalan's best work (not including the script he wrote for Stuart Little, which, as far as screenplays go, is only eclipsed by Casablanca). Dude could churn out crap for the remainder of his career -- if he still has one -- and nothing will ever taint that mutha. It's a fanboy's wet dream: the ultimate superhero origin story. In fact, I wouldn't hate on MNS if he pulled a Kevin Smith and reverted back to the tried-and-true formula with a sequel. The scene with Willis and his son in the weight room makes me giddy every time I watch it, as does Samuel Jackson knocking comic books around with

(extreme prejudice)

his cane. Fuck it, after I finish typing this up I'm throwing that badboy on the DVD, player****.

Getting back to Signs for a sec, I completely agree with you vis a vis the old skool vibe of the flick (and it does kick more ass when watched in the theater; I watched it twice during its opening weekend, and the audience's shrieks only got more intense -- thus more pleasurable for me -- the second viewing), perfectly encapsulated in the scene where Merrill visits the army recruitment office. What bugged me when I watched it again on Sunday was the contrived and/or overly sentimental stuff, such as Gibson telling his kids what their mother said when they were born, Joaquin Phoenix telling Mel he never wants to see that look in his eyes again, and the "I can't hear my children" line.

But you know what, I can still dig all that (the "children" line is right up my alley; I'd probably write something similar myself), and for me Signs remains a masterpiece, despite its numerous flaws in logic and storytelling. BECAUSE OF its numerous flaws in logic and storytelling, actually (the Forest Gump Corollary; by the way, Idealjetsam is giving me the middle finger right now*****)

Fuzon: Hold up, Spark. I'm the one giving you the middle finger right now. Shit, I mean, actually, I was throwing up my index finger, but you know what I meant by the infantile gesture. Furthermore, let's not get back to Signs, as Unbreakable is where it's at, with regard to Shyamalan's body of work. I first saw Unbreakable on DVD in the summer of 2001. Seriously, I'll admit that I was behind the times. The thing is, during that particular period of my life, I was working third shift, packaging GPS components for a major corporation with government financing. The job was awesome, especially when one considers that in an eight-point-five hour shift, you had two fifteen minute breaks, a thirty minute lunch, another twenty minutes off for when the computer terminal servers were rebooting, and then an additional thirty minutes of bathroom time due to shift overlap (the day-shifters were union, and they'd be damned if they let us tell them when to get on the station). What I'm trying to say is that I was damn tired throughout those months, and I had rented the film one morning after work, and it was so good that I had elected to remain -wide- awake, insanely enamored with Shyamalan's masterwork. I'm also attempting the contrast that with Signs. Would I have stayed up to watch that, the Sixth Sense, or the Village? Fuck no.

Spark: It's funny, TMH hates Children of Men, IDJ hates Dostoevsky, K-Hot hates PJ's King Kong remake, yet they all have something in common: an inclination towards altruism rather than cynicism. That's what Signs has in spades, and it's why I love it (also why I love Crash, another film heavy on the altruism vibe). Also why I love you, pickle.

Fuzon: Altruism rather than cynicism? Is there a third option, like 'Addicted to sausage gravy and biscuits'?

Denz: I hated Crash, though. Circle of life.

Spark: What are the odds that Willis will appear in a third Shyamalan film?

Fuzon: Slim, I say, as in there is less than a twenty percent chance. Demi, possibly, as she's still smarting from Striptease. I bet she would have made a positively delightful 'Lady in the Water'.

Spark: Shut up. To conclude this thought in a totally PK way, here's a quote from James Joyce regarding the works of Dostoevsky:

"Tolstoy admired him but he thought that he had little artistic accomplishment or mind. Yet, as he said, 'he admired his heart', a criticism which contains a great deal of truth, for though his characters do act extravagantly, madly, almost, still their basis is firm enough underneath. The Brothers Karamozov made a deep impression on me. He created some unforgettable scenes. Madness you may call it, but therein may be the secret of his genius. I prefer the word exaltation, exaltation which can merge into madness, perhaps. In fact all great men have had that vein in them; it was the source of their greatness; the reasonable man achieves nothing."

Word.



In Episode 2 - Spike Lee, Kimochi and C-Webb's knee.
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**** Intentionally-misplaced commas are the new asterisks.
***** Psychedelic Kimchi is like a box of chocolates: you never know what you're gonna get.