don't mess with a bearded man- lady in the water rant and mini-review

so last night my lovely wife and i (along with some friends) went to see the new m. night shymalan movie, lady in the water. we have been fans of all of his movies, and i would rank them in this order (this does not include the new one):

1) signs
2) the village
3) unbreakable
4) the sixth sense

i love night's commitment to his story, even though every critic in the world wants him to make the seventh sense because they are still looking for the twist at the end of every movie. and yes, the critics have slammed this film, saying it's boring, confusing, arrogant, juvenile and it doesn't have a twist ending. but i took this with a grain of salt, since the critics hated the village and i really liked it.

we arrived at the theater on time and i was dismayed to see a large contingency of young people in the audience. there were probably 50-60 people in the room and about 1/3 of them were packs of hormonal children. these are not my favorite type of people to watch movies with because they feel compelled to impress their friends with flatulence and giggling throughout something they just paid 7-10 dollars for. as expected they were restless and giddy, and i knew we were in for some trouble.

during the opening sequence of the film there is a monologue that describes the ancient relationship between the people of the sea and the people of the land. it's about 2 minutes long and has animated stick figures and drawings illustrating what the narrator is describing. apparently the children thought it was still the previews because they were talking and laughing at full volume, which i wasn't going for. i decided to set the tone early and yelled, in a very loud and commanding voice, "STOP TALKING! THIS IS A MOVIE!" immediately the theater was fillled with a quiet, aside from a few nervous giggles. i had never done anything like that before (although i have wanted to many times) and i found it worked quite well. for a little while.

during the progression of the movie the kids ramped up their noise level again. they screamed at all the "jump scenes", which didn't bug me because it's to be expected. but as the drama increased and there were tender moments in the film, the kids couldn't handle it and kept talking and making stupid comments about characters in the movie. one scene in particular was heart-wrenching to me and yet the experience was marred by the sheer idiocy of 20 people in the room who were uncomfortable with a little bit of real human emotion. they were looking for a horror movie and a fairy tale was told.

the great thing was that i complained to the usher at the end of the movie. i pointed at the 4 worst kids and i told him that they were very loud and disruptive during the movie. he responded, and i quote "do you want me to punch them in the face?" nice. i think i'll be calling his boss today.

as for the movie itself, i thought it was very good. paul giamatti was fantastic as the stuttering cleveland heep. m. night had his largest part by far, which i initially thought would be really distracting, but i thought his performance was understated and appropriate. there were a lot of other interesting characters, though none of them were developed fully. i thought it was curious that the entire movie took place at the apartment complex; there were no other scenes located anywhere else. i can't think of any other movies that i have seen that were like that.

in closing, i'll be going to see it again in the theater, hopefully with a theater audience that includes 7 other people, 5 women and 2 men, all over the age of 40.