This movie reunites the team that made the sleeper hit
of last year, The Sixth Sense.
Unbreakable
is
produced, written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan and stars Bruce Willis.
This is another spooky story, this time with Willis as a man who is literally
unbreakable. As seen in all the trailers, Willis is in a terrible
train wreck and not only is he the only survivor but he doesn't have a
scratch on him. Soon, he realizes that he has never been sick a day
in his life and begins to wonder what the deal is. He meets a man
with an explanation, played with a lot of creepiness by Samuel L. Jackson.
Jackson is the opposite of Willis. He is the breakable man since he suffers
from a rare disorder that makes his bones very brittle. His simple
explanation, since he makes his living selling comic books, is that Willis
is a superhero and just doesn't know it. If this sounds weird, it
is, and it gets a lot weirder. But Unbreakable is a very compelling
film. It is not as satisfying as Sixth
Sense but it is good. This is definitely not an action movie.
In much the same style as Sixth
Sense, Shyamalan slowly builds the suspense. Everything moves
along almost in slow motion as we watch Willis discover exactly what his
powers are and why Jackson is so interested in him. In Sixth
Sense and here, Bruce Willis shows that he can act and act well. He
is very good here as the confused man who can't be hurt. We know
that Jackson can act and he has a good role here as he plays the extrovert
to Willis' introvert. Helping Willis make sense of it all, are his
estranged wife (Robin Wright Penn) and his son (Spencer Treat Clark).
The heartbreakingly beautiful Wright is, as always, very good. She has
made some very nice films including The
Princess Bride, The Playboys
and
Forrest
Gump but isn't seen on the screen that often, possibly because she
has spent too much time working things out with her hubby, Sean Penn. She
is a bit wasted in Unbreakable mainly because her relationship with
Willis which is introduced well, has no payoff at the end of the movie.
Clark, as the son who dearly wants his father to be a superhero, is adequate
but pales in comparison to Willis' previous co-star in Sixth
Sense, Haley Joel Osment. The only important relationship in
this film is between the unbreakable and breakable men, Willis and Jackson
who are both playing against their usual macho typecasting.
I can't say more without giving things away but the ending leaves as many
questions as answers. Still, I really like the way Shyamalan directs. It
makes this movie worth seeing.