The Shyamalan Phenomenon

The Setting: How come there are so many movies that don’t live up to their hype?

I went to the movies the other day to see Quantum of Solace. I didn't like it as much as Casino Royale, also featuring Daniel Craig, but I liked it more than the critics seemed to. Before the movie started, I realized that I could probably enjoy sitting in a theatre and watching nothing but movie previews for two hours, as long as there were a medium popcorn and a large Slurpee involved. Whomever is in charge of editing those movie trailers (the directors?), does a really good job of making you want to see the actual movies. The trailers are like little two-minute movies, with nothing but good parts throughout.

The problem is, the two-hour versions of many of those movies can't match the excitement of the trailers. This happens quite a bit with M. Night Shyamalan movies. I always want to see his movies but often end up disappointed. One example is The Happening, starring Mark Wahlberg. Did you see it? Remember how great the trailers were? Don't get me wrong: the movie was OK. It had some good suspenseful scenes, and it had that message about mankind not destroying the earth, blah, blah, blah, but I just wanted more. Check out various trailers for The Happening.