Rating 3/10
Getting a production greenlit is a tough challenge. Every year, countless aspiring filmmakers attempt to get their concepts approved so they can produce their cinematic debut. Thus, when a director achieves this milestone, one presumes their idea to be more compelling than most. After all, a studio has been persuaded to invest its financial resources and clout. This explanation makes this movie’s existence all the more perplexing.
The Watchers has been promoted as a horror picture but astonishingly lacks suspense, narrative cohesion, and character development. The rationale behind its approval might seem incomprehensible until one discovers it was directed by M. Night Shyamalan’s daughter. In this industry, the age-old saying holds: It’s not what you know. It’s who you know.
Our story takes off when an American girl named Mina (Dakota Fanning) is stranded after her car breaks down in the middle of an uncharted forest in Western Ireland. Abandonded and alone, she ventures through the ominous woodland. Suddenly, she encounters a frantic woman (Olwen Fouéré) who shouts for Mina to enter her concrete bunker. As Mina dives inside, the door slams shut, and the outside air is filled with terrifying screams.
Mina finds herself in a room with a wall of glass on one side, an electric light, and three people. She is trapped along with Ciara (Georgina Campbell) and Daniel (Oliver Finnegan). The apparent expert on the situation, Madeline (Olwen Fouéré), explains that anyone who fails to reach the bunker before nightfall faces dreadful consequences. It is then that the Watchers emerge. These eerie creatures come above ground to observe their captive humans. Mina’s desperation grows as she yearns to understand who the Watchers are, why they imprison people, and, most importantly, how can she escape this nightmare.
Take a venture into a grove of disappointment as we plunge into a poorly constructed plot and frustratingly undefined characters. Madeline, in particular, behaves in a bewildering manner that defies logic. She explains that their quartet must adhere to a complicated set of rules. Madeline enunciates in the exalted tones that no sane human would ever say with a straight face. She speaks like a medieval sage. Never mind the fact that these rules will be broken anyway without repercussions.
Director Ishana Night Shyamalan also wrote the screenplay. This script is an insult to an intelligent person, treating the audience as if we’re as clueless as the writer seems to be. She doesn’t write dialogue in a cadence that humans use. As the newcomer, Mina should have at least said something like, “Is she for real?” to acknowledge the utter ridiculousness of Madeline, who is obviously not normal. Alas, the others behave in a manner that makes them seem like robots. No, that’s not the twist, but everything will be explained in a convoluted conclusion that justifies Madeline’s behavior. It’s still not a satisfying reason.
Despite a plethora of shortcomings, the account’s greatest asset is undoubtedly its cinematography. The film looks good. Eli Arenson lensed the 2021 atmospheric folk horror picture Lamb from Iceland. Here, he is the MVP as he imbues proceedings with a stylish sheen. The forest environs are rendered effectively eerie with overhead shots and elegant flourishes. Unfortunately, as lovely as the photography is, it cannot make you forget how awful the movie turns out to be.
Sadly, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Ishana Night Shyamalan injects all the negative attributes of her father’s worst movies (Lady in the Water, The Happening) into her directorial debut. The Watchers is a slow, glacial-paced saga filled with poorly defined characters, all in service of a bare thread of an idea that culminates in a gotcha ending that doesn’t justify what the audience has endured. Even the most patient “watcher” will long for a better movie.
06-06-24