To Watch or Not to Watch: A Review of Unbreakable by M. Night Shymalan

The film Unbreakable came out in 2000. It was my first taste of M. Night Shyamalan's unique style. When I tried watching the movie for the first time, I quickly lost interest. I believe I made it though the first twenty minutes. I tried three more times since then to watch this film, each time with the goal of making it to the end and each time not quite getting there. It wasn't until my fourth attempt that I was able to watch the credits roll.

M. Night Shyamalan is one of my favorite directors, even though my opinion of this film is somewhat mixed. Signs, The Village, and his latest The Happening were brilliant. Although his writing style is misunderstood and plagued with a slow pace, he can pull a viewer into the many dimensions of a character. He doesn't follow the cookie-cutter Hollywood plots that are repeated by other film makers year after year. In Signs, he drew me in with the plot behind the preacher's torn faith. Shyamalan also has a flare for throwing a viewer off track. I'm one who can usually figure out the end of a film before it starts. But with Shyamalan's films, I'm always delightfully surprised that even I didn't see the end coming.

Unbreakable didn't quite do it for me. I appreciate the plot and the point made in the end. It's about how two characters that are complete opposites of each other, but find that they are very much the same. Samuel L Jackson's character, Elijah Price, is reclusive and searching for meaning to his existence. Bruce Willis' character, David Dunn, leads a seemingly monotonously life, daydreaming about the days when he was a football star. Both are looking for meaning and purpose to their lives. Neither can fill the hole inside of themselves without the other.

During previous attempts to understand the film, I didn't comprehend its comic book theme until the last time around. A friend told me to look at it from the standpoint that I would if I were reading a comic book. I'm not a comic book fan. But I was able to liken David Dunn's rain coat to Superman's cape. He symbolically puts it away in the closet, hiding his identity as Superman does with a pair of glasses.

I definitely liked the surprise ending when you find out that Jackson's character was behind the terrorist attacks that killed hundreds. He did it all in the pursuit of the truth about Dunn's remarkable ability to withstand illness and injury. At the cost of many lives, both men found their true purpose. One could never have done it without the other.

This was the saving grace of the film. I thought this film was going to end with a frustrating cliff hanger and then make me feel like I just wasted two hours of my life. But despite its slow pace, the film did come to a concrete and meaningful ending. Would I watch it again? Probably, if I didn't have anything else better to do. Do I recommend it? If you like Shyamalan's style or you have an interest in comic book heroes and villain, I would recommend it to you. If not, you will probably be very bored.