Lady In The Water - Review

Discuss this movie on our message board!

Length: 110 min

Rated: PG-13

Distributor: Warner Brothers.

Release Date: 2006-07-21

Starring: Paul Giamatti, Bryce Dallas Howard, Bob Balaban, Jeffrey Wright, Sarita Choudhury, Freddy Rodriguez, Bill Irwin, Jared Harris

Directed by M. Night Shyamalan

Produced by M. Night Shyamalan, Sam Mercer

Written by M. Night Shyamalan

Visit the movie's Official Site!

Reviewed by Scott Gwin : 2006-07-20 13:27:42

Wondering if you have any inner child left or if it's been completely devoured by the soul crushing abyss of the real world? M. Night Shyamalan has created a movie that might be able to help you figure it out. His latest effort is just what its advertisements claim: a bedtime story, complete with mythical creatures, legendary circumstances and unexpected heroes. Some audience members will walk out of the theater frustrated and fixated on the fact the main character is a narf. Others won’t be distracted by what she’s called, allowing themselves instead to be enthralled by the magic of her tale.

Shyamalan builds his movies around fantastical what-if scenarios occurring in everyday life, a tradition he continues with Lady in the Water. Bedtime stories usually involve extraordinary people in distant lands, set in a time long, long ago. What if it happened to a group of unusual but average people in a mundane apartment complex in the world and time where we live? Cleveland Heep (Paul Giamatti) is the maintenance man at just such a humdrum building, a community called The Cove. He goes about his boring weekly routine, hiding from the realities of his own life, unaware that he is about to be thrown into an unexpected realm of danger and destiny.

Cleveland suspects that someone has been swimming in The Cove’s pool after hours, but the culprit isn’t who or what he expected. Her name is Story (Bryce Dallas Howard) and she claims to be a sea nymph, or narf. She’s looking for the one she has been sent to awaken. Unsure what to make of this, Cleveland asks around the complex and finds that only one of the tenants knows anything about narfs. An old, reluctant, oriental woman has heard of them in a bedtime story she was told as a child, and her revelations are more than Cleveland bargained for.

The ancient story goes that once upon a time those who lived on land communed with a people from the waters of the sea. Those in the sea gave guidance and wisdom to the land dwellers, helping them to grow and remain at peace. But over time men moved away from the waters, became violent and greedy, killing each other to control the land. In an effort to reach mankind, the sea folk decided to send their children, the sea nymphs, out to awaken within certain men the power to change the hearts of others and bring peace to the world. Once the person a narf is sent to awaken has looked upon her, she will be returned to the sea by a magnificent eagle. It all seems beautiful and simple, but there’s a catch. Story is being hunted by wolf-like creatures known as scrunts. They feed on the narfs, keeping them from completing their work and thereby maintaining strife in the world of men. Cleveland dedicates himself to protecting Story from her scrunt pursuer and seeing to it that she completes her work and escapes. Though he has the best of intentions, there are powers that Cleveland doesn’t understand, and he must solve the riddles of this bedtime story to see the narf safely home.

The story is bizarrely magical, like something from Hayao Miyazaki. Where Miyazaki masters his storytelling with breathtaking animation, Shyamalan uses his always keen eye for cinematography. Even if you hated M. Night’s other movies, there’s no denying his unique visual style, something he takes to new heights with Lady in the Water. Visual style isn’t the only place Shyamalan shows growth as a filmmaker. He has finally gotten past his need to surprise the audience with an earth-shattering twist ending. This time around he scatters smaller twists throughout the story, a refreshing switch.

Lady in the Water’s cast, comprised mostly of unknowns, would hold it back if not for a handful of veterans. Paul Giamatti finally gets a chance to step into the limelight of a lead role and his turn as Cleveland Heep is the glue that holds the movie together. Bryce Dallas Howard is perfect as the sea nymph, keeping the character warm but distant enough to make us believe she’s from another world. Shyamalan continues his tradition of appearing in his own films, giving himself a slightly larger role than he’s had in any of his previous pics. As usual, he’s not bad, but his choice of character seems a bit self-indulgent and the part requires a little more depth than he’s able to conjure.

A lot of people will flat out hate this film. It’s won’t be easy to get past all the narfs, scrunts and fairytale conceits. But if you can get over your grown-up complex and lose yourself in the story, you just might find an enchanting blend of ancient and modern storytelling in an experience that reassures us we all have a purpose in life, even if we don’t know what it is yet.

Latest Movie Reviews:

Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D

Kit Kittredge: An American Girl

Thumbnails Gallery for Lady In The Water

Social Bookmark This Article

Blinklist

Del.icio.us

Digg

Furl

Slashdot

Facebook

StumbleUpon

Yahoo!

Propeller

Comment on “Lady In The Water”

Note: This website is not intended for use by minors. The views expressed in this comments section are not necessarily our own. Comments that we deem to be poorly worded, off topic, or threatening will not be published. For free, uncensored discussion visit our forum.

Caprice Says:
July 22nd, 2006 at 11:06
I freally liked "Lady in the Water" very much. Both the ensemble cast acting and the specific location cinematography were perfectly suited for weaving the myth and symbolism of hopefulness for the everyday person. An additional observation, I find it very telling that the people who get paid to give their opinions about films (this particular critic notwithstanding), 99% across the board, did not like this movie for all the same reasons. Their focus on Shyamalan's "ego" and Shyamalan's disdain for film "critics" as represented by one of the character's in "Lady in the Water" is ludricous to me. Get over yourself! Talk about the film! I found "Lady in the Water" to be a unique experience of hopeful, innocent, imaginative storytelling.

logan portell Says:
July 22nd, 2006 at 16:27
what is up with the sound mics in some of the scenes.

Luthien Tinuviel Says:
July 23rd, 2006 at 12:15
I agree with your review, Scott. All in all I thought that the movie was pretty good. It was nice to, for 2 hours, lose myself in a work of children's storytelling. I think that that is the problem with many of the critical reviews of Lady in the Water: the critics ground the movie too much in reality. Granted, the setting is a seemingly normal apartment complex with seemingly normal people, but isn't one of the points of the story is that no one ever is what they seem to be?

I didn't have a problem with the death of the film critic in the movie. To me it wasn't so much a declaration of hate against film critics in general, but more of an affirmation to one of the points of the story: finding out what one's purpose is. The film critic was an arrogant know-it-all who thought that all things in life could be confined within the pages of a movie script. His role in the story was not a film critic as a critic, but someone who thought that he could predict the purposes of the other characters through a series of formulas. The point of the story being that no one can tell anyone else what their role in the story of life will be.

trista Says:
July 24th, 2006 at 03:30
i enjoyed how the movie was filmed, especially the night shots with the dog thing. and i think the movie had a good point but to me the way he tried to get his point across bored me to death. yea the movie had some twists but the twists could be seen before they were revealed. i kept waiting for some big ending twist like the M. Night movies i enjoy so much and suddenly the movie was over and i was left disappointed. also the way he kept telling what the legend said would happen and then it happening kinda annoyed me, i wanted to see the plot unfold not be told it by a character. i think it was a good idea that was poorly executed. but hey what do i know right i am just a mindless movie watcher.

errick Says:
July 24th, 2006 at 06:42
Good review, but who the hell writes this crap?
seriously an old reuctant "oriental woman?"
please try and be a little politically correct.

Scott Says:
July 25th, 2006 at 13:15
I'm sorry, which part did I get wrong? Was she not older, reluctant, of oriental origin and a woman? I didn't mean to offend anyone, and I don't believe I used any offensive terms. "Politically correct" is a matter of opinion depending on what your politics are.

Amber Says:
April 1st, 2007 at 23:15
I thought the movie was fantastic! But, I am a fantasy lover. I enjoy many movies and thought that this movie was well done. It was a good review too. By the way, who wrote the review?

Alexane Dee Says:
July 13th, 2007 at 06:38

okey. i'm a MNS fan but this film is definitely not as good as his other films.

Back to Lady In The Water

Lady In The Water - Review

Social Bookmark This Article

Comment on “Lady In The Water”

Leave a Reply