'Glass' goes full-throttle Shyamalan

Nobody knows how to baffle and frustrate audiences quite like M. Night Shyamalan.

After the breakout success of “The Sixth Sense” in 1999, Shyamalan decided to try something totally different. Long before the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Christopher Nolan’s more grounded Batman trilogy, Shyamalan made “Unbreakable,” a quiet, contemplative character study about a “real world” superhero.

Basically the first act of a typical comic book adventure stretched into feature length form, the movie wasn’t scary like “The Sixth Sense” and it didn’t have a culture-shocking twist, so “Unbreakable” only made a fraction of the cash at the box office.

In the 19 years since its release, “Unbreakable” grew to be a cult favorite, thanks in large part to a distinct visual style, a focused screenplay and stellar performances by Samuel L. Jackson and, yes, even Bruce Willis. It’s Shyamalan’s best film, I think, because of how he purposefully keeps the story from spiraling too far from reality.

Of course, most know how, um, inconsistent the rest of the writer/director’s filmography becomes after “Unbreakable.” Following a string of colossal duds like “The Happening” and “After Earth,” Shyamalan rebounded more recently with lower budget horror tales, most notably 2016’s “Split,” starring James McAvoy as a man with 23 distinct personalities (including a superpowered, murderous Beast).

The final minute of “Split” turned out to be a backdoor sequel to “Unbreakable,” and now “Glass” caps the surprise trilogy by bringing Willis, Jackson and McAvoy together for a championship bout.

All that backstory is worth mentioning because “Glass” serves as a good example of a filmmaker basically setting himself up for failure. From a tonal and visual perspective, “Unbreakable” and “Split” don’t have all that much in common, so slamming them together was never going to be the easiest thing to do, especially when fans of one of those movies have been clamoring for a follow-up for nearly two decades.

Basically, “Glass” is a huge mess, but oh my, what a fascinating mess.

“Glass” is full-throttle Shyamalan, for better or worse. Everything is connected. There are no coincidences. The last 20 minutes is a compromised Jenga tower of at least a half-dozen twists. And more than anything, the filmmaker seems to be giddy about pulling the rug out from under most audience expectations.

The movie wastes no time slamming the two superpowered humans at each other. McAvoy’s Kevin Michael Crumb/The Horde is confronted by Willis’ David Dunn (local media refers to his vigilante alter ego as “The Overseer”) in the first 20 minutes.

Before they can settle the score though, they’re apprehended abruptly and sent to a psychiatric facility overseen by Dr. Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson) who tries to gaslight them into thinking they’re just regular dudes. The hospital also houses Jackson’s Elijah Price, the brittle bone disease-suffering mastermind that Dunn put away all those years ago. By the way, for a movie called “Glass,” it sure takes a long time for the titular Mr. Glass to make his true entrance into this story.

I won’t say more about what happens next, but “Glass” spends the majority of the time at this hospital, and, if nothing else, the movie allows plenty of opportunity for McAvoy to dig around in the Big Acting sandbox. His Horde of characters are still enthralling to watch, and Shyamalan at least knows to lean the movie on him for this middle hour.

Jackson also delivers another terrific performance, even with the most limited screen time of the three leads. A charismatic villain humbled by a crippling physical limitation, Mr. Glass has a vulnerability that makes even his most murderous behavior relatable.

As anyone who sampled the national reviews of “Glass” knows, the movie contains all sorts of weird and misshapen plot points and lines of dialogue. While those shortcomings make themselves known, the movie still manages to engage and build momentum, again largely because of the performances.

Even the ending grasps for something far more ambitious than a typical superhero climax. Sure, the plot explodes in several different directions, but for all its insanity, two of the three leads get thoughtful and engrossing dramatic arcs.

The core problems with “Glass” hinge on two major missteps: 1. Willis’ David Dunn has no story arc beyond the first half hour. He’s present for the movie, but Shyamalan doesn’t even try to take the character any further than what he explored in “Unbreakable.” As a result, the movie also gets saddled by another disinterested Willis performance (the kind we’ve seen for many, many years now).

And 2. Too much of “Glass” centers on the motivations of Sarah Paulson’s character and her efforts to convince these characters they aren’t superhuman. But anyone who saw “Unbreakable” and “Split” can already dismiss that possibility, and the climax’s big reveals hinge on some pretty ridiculous stuff tied to her motivations.

More people will like “Glass” than what some of those vicious critical marks have suggested. Interesting characters performed by good actors can make even the most problematic screenplays seem halfway decent (here’s my now weekly “Green Book” diss). But devotees of “Split” or especially “Unbreakable” will be left with some uneasy feelings about where Shyamalan chooses to end things.

Ultimately, whether you like it or not, “Glass” will be a movie worth revisiting. Because full-throttle Shyamalan is almost always too baffling for one viewing.

- • •

Tyler Wilson can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com