(Paris) From Sixth Sense at signs going through his latest film which hits theaters on Wednesday, M. Night Shyamalan has a habit of toying with viewers’ nerves. The director is no more tender with Hollywood, which in his eyes has become “totally dysfunctional”.
Reconciling “art and commerce is something complicated”, declared the king of supernatural thrillers, also author and producer of his films, during an interview in Paris for the release of Knock at the Cabin.
In Hollywood today, to “speak in general terms, there are movies that are just incestuous, that are just masturbatory, that just speak to themselves. Hollywood speaks to itself,” he said.
“And then there are movies that say they’re made for the audience, and (that think) the audience is stupid. So they take all the soul out and just make their movie by calculations,” he continued. “These are signs that our industry is completely dysfunctional.”
For him, the American studios have completely changed compared to the time of the release of Sixth Sensehis first major public success with Bruce Willis, released in 1999, the year of Matrixof Blair Witch Project, In the Skin of John Malkovich or Magnoliaall of which have become “classics”.
“The industry was different then, it was about finding the best storytellers to tell stories to the greatest audience, and everyone was working towards that goal.”
Hire a wrestler
To maintain his freedom, the 52-year-old American director explains that he found the only solution “to leave the system:” I pay myself and make films as small as possible each time by taking big risks “.
In Knock at the CabinM. Night Shyamalan resumes his favorite themes, with an isolated family in a cabin deep in the woods, who sees four strangers disembark, explaining to them that the end of the world has arrived and that the only way to avoid it is to sacrifice life. one of them.
The question that the characters in the film ask themselves is “do we trust each other, do we trust society, do we trust what we see? “, explains the director to AFP.
The film seems to want to echo contemporary concerns about fake newsin which the most eccentric theories can end up provoking violent acts.
In any case, being independent allows the director not to have to ask permission to “put a gay couple at the center of the story”, as is the case with this same-sex family, or if it is “a good idea of hiring a wrestler” like Dave Bautista, the actor with the build of a mirrored wardrobe ( Guardians of the Galaxy, Glass Onion), and who plays the leader of the Knights of the Apocalypse threatening the family.
The key is knowing how to speak to the public, continues M. Night Shyamalan, who explains that it is his “way to stay healthy in this sick industry”.
To this recipe is added the art of the “twist” specific to the director of Indian origin, who made him famous, and which the spectator will seek in Knock at the Cabinadapted from an American novel by Paul Tremblay.