A tale where one man comes out unscathed out of any disasters whatsoever, while there’s his opposite who breaks down (literally) at merely a wink. Unbreakable is a strange but absolutely rivetting saga of sin and redemption, while an ordinary man conquers his low self esteem. And what! Emerges a hero, of course....
Manoj Night Shyamalan is in mercurial form after the suprise success of ’The Sixth Sense’. The surprising fact is that his movies lack the usual razzmatazz of a typical Hollywood flick, yet it ensnares you into a trance like situation that you just can’t do without it.
His penchant for filming his home town Philadelphia is a kind of risk that paid off with his debut film. He successfully repeats the same risk yet again. And the results are fantastic. See it to believe as to what I am talkin about. Slow pace, a laidback calmness that rubs off on its inhabitants and dusky quietness.
Shyamalan has got this eerie way of looking at things that makes him Different. His camera talks while the long interludes of silence speak loudly. In a way, his approach is a lot similar to Satyajit Ray who exemplified the cinematic language. Shyamalan’s camera is like an evesdropper, a casual onlooker grasping the gruesome details of day-to-day life with a sleepy nonchalance.
I wouldn’t divulge the story of the movie other than what I already have. For it is meant to be discovered on its own. The slow pace of the movie is both an asset as well as a liability. For it adds to the mysterious sinister element. Yet, there are stages when it drags for no obvious or related reason.
Bruce Willis is good as usual. But it is Samual L Jackson who hits you hard on the face with the persistence of beliefs touching on madness now and then. I wouldn’t be surprised if he bags a couple of awards. Another plus point is the background score. It is simply brilliant. No other way to describe it. It is almost like a character in the movie that protrudes its presence now and then.
Unbreakable may not break too many records, yet it is a remarkably experimental film. The dawn of eminence has finally heralded for Night for he has proven his mettle with a good followup to a debut film.