Melodrama and Male Crisis in Signs and Unbreakable

Abstract

Though he is best known to moviegoers as a fantasist, melodrama is the time-honored genre that underlies, in one form or another, all the films M. Night Shyamalan has released thus far. Following the popular view, critics, however, have thus far largely focused on Shyamalan’s intriguing engagement with supernatural, metaphysical, or religious themes.1 No doubt, the director’s proficient audacity in dealing with such subject matter has had much to do with the substantial reputation he has gained as an intriguing fabulist, whose special talent is the unpredictable final plot twist. But Shyamalan’s narratives are also deeply generic in their focus on the restoration of dysfunctional family (and sometimes communal) relationships. In embracing such Capra-esque themes, he displays none of the interest that other directors of his generation have shown during the past decade and a half in evoking what we might call the after-scene of melodrama, that locus of alienation deeply marked by the failure to find and maintain some meaningful connection to others. Instead, Shyamalan, particularly in his first five films, has crafted narratives that move through deep crisis, personal and familial, to endorse traditional institutions and gender roles.