Devil
Directed by John Erick Dowdle
Universal Pictures, 2010
By Sean Kelly
To most of the mainstream audience, M Night Shyamalan has become a bit of a joke. When the trailer for this film played in theatres, audiences would usually groan when Shyamalan’s name appeared on screen. However, after seeing it, I have to say that the film itself actually turned out to be quite decent.
Devil is the first chapter of the Shyamalan-produced trilogy called The Night Chronicles. Essentially, this trilogy involves taking some of Shyamalan’s unproduced film ideas and handing them off to up-and-coming directors. For this film, the directing duties were given to John Erick Dowdle, who is probably best known for his 2008 film Quarantine.
Narration sets-up the mythology behind the film – in an event called The Devil’s Meeting, the Devil assumes a human form and torments a group of people before claiming their souls. In the film, five strangers end up being stuck in an elevator. One of them will turn out to be the Devil in disguise; the rest will be killed off one-by-one.
This is one of the better films that Shyamalan has been involved with. Held side-by-side against films he has directed, it would probably rank amongst his best work. That said, the film probably will not do much to win back people who absolutely hate everything to do with Shyamalan.
As a horror film, Devil is not really that scary, even though there are a couple suspenseful scenes. I thought that the film does do a pretty good job at keeping you guessing about which of the people is the Devil and, in true Shyamalan fashion, the revelation is a bit of a twist.
Overall, while it’s not the scariest of films, I consider Devil to be a bit of a return to form for M Night Shyamalan. Depending on how the other two chapters of The Night Chronicles turn out, perhaps Shyamalan can rebrand himself as a producer, rather than director. Only time will tell.
I too enjoyed a trailer for Devil in a theatre that groaned allowed at Shyamalan’s name.
I guess what we really need to do is determine where the problem lies- is it his storytelling and direction, or the stories themselves with their “clever twists”? And I imagine the problem is in the latter. In that case, maybe he should put some focus NOT on his producing (particularly when he’s producing his own story ideas) but direct a solid picture.
Of course that’s coming from someone that DIDN’T check out The Last Airbender, so maybe that’s out too.