Disney - Movie Reviews: Lady In The Water

The Man Who Heard Voices is now hearing those of the critics, and they're likely to haunt him. M. Night Shyamalan, the center of Michael Bamberger's book about the director's split from Disney over his script for Lady in the Water, is receiving harsher treatment in most of his reviews of the movie than he ever did from Disney Production President Nina Jacobson (who was fired this week). These are some of the descriptions of his movie (which eventually was made for Warner Bros.): Lou Lumenick in the New York Post: "I have to say it, but Disney was right." Kevin Crust in the Los Angeles Times: "Bears out the reservations expressed by the Disney executives who balked at making the movie." Liam Lacey in the Toronto Globe and Mail: "Self-indulgent ramblings." Geoff Pevere in the Toronto Star: "This is one nutty movie." Amy Biancolli in the Houston Chronicle: "A failure." Manohla Dargis in the New York Times: "A folly ... but watchable." Jack Mathews in the New York Daily News: "Convoluted and ultimately preposterous." The movie does garner a handful of positive notices. Desson Thomson in the Washington Post calls it "a captivating amalgam of mystery, thriller and mythic fantasy" that eclipses Shyamalan's 1999 film The Sixth Sense "for sheer inventiveness, audacity and narrative derring-do.."

21/07/2006