Fantasy? Bah! Scoff!

There lately has been a small debate on cinekklesia regarding the fantasy genre, particularly as manifested in M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable.Below is a copy of my comments regarding Paul Marchbanks' defense of the film.

Two points:

First of all, while it is possible for fantasy to express "the struggles of [our] lives in effective, truthful metaphors," the genre usually ends up distracting me from whatever theme it wants to get across. If a director really wanted to dig deep into an aspect of the human condition, then he/she generally would be better served by a genre that more closely mimics that condition (at least in a material sense). For the most part, I am not as moved by artifacts of sci-fi/fantasy as I am by more "realistic" fare.

Second, as I mentioned in my review, I did find the first two-thirds of Unbreakable quite compelling. I did not "decline to admit" or "consciously evade" Shymalan's ideas; rather, I paid strict attention. However, when the director ventured from his brooding into superhero sloppiness, everything fell apart. Courtney is right: superhero movies generally succeed when they are campy enterprises and when their messages are simple and short (lasting only as long as the multiplex's bucket of popcorn). If Shymalan had stayed just a little closer to "reality," then he would have made a better film (and I even might have acknowledged him as the serious director he so desperately wants to be).