Here it is: the long-awaited conclusion to the weirdest superhero trilogy of all time.
Glass
Director and Writer: M. Night Shyamalan
Starring: Bruce Willis, James McAvoy, and Samuel L. Jackson
Music By: West Dylan Thordson
Rated PG-13 (Contains some violence and disturbing images, such as James McAvoy in drag)
Warning: Review contains spoilers for Unbreakable and Split.
Shortly after the events of Split, Kevin Wendell Crumb, aka the Horde, is still at large, preying on the “impure” teen girls of Philadelphia. But now he’s come to the attention of David Dunn, who, for about 15 years, has been operating as a vigilante under the name of Overseer. David confronts Kevin to save his latest kidnapping victims, but before the two of them can complete their showdown, they’re captured by police and sent to a shockingly understaffed psychiatric hospital–one which also happens to be the home of crippled evil genius Elijah Price, aka Mr. Glass. At the hospital, they meet a psychiatrist who claims to specialise in curing people of the delusion that they have superpowers. While our three main characters try to figure out what is real and what’s in their heads, David’s son Joseph teams up with Casey, the sole survivor of the Horde’s kidnapping spree, to free them without letting their secrets out of the bag.
As I think I’ve mentioned before, I enjoy M. Night Shyamalan movies, and I’m not ashamed to say it. What I like most about them is that they tend to be totally free of that stale, processed, made-by-committee feeling that so many big blockbusters have. Every M. Night movie I’ve seen feels like a movie that M. Night wanted to make, not one that some studio or focus group told him to make. His movies are messy, flawed, and almost always completely original. In my view, that makes them a rare gem in the media landscape nowadays.
They also tend not to follow current media trends, which has had a huge impact on the Unbreakable trilogy and how it’s been received. The first movie (which is still the best, I think) was a deconstruction/reconstruction of superhero tropes that came out before superheroes were mainstream enough for such a thing to resonate with most audiences. I expect that’s a major reason why it took 17 years for it to get a sequel. When the sequel did come out, nobody knew it was a superhero movie until they watched the final scene. So Glass is the only film in the trilogy to be met with typical audience expectations for a superhero movie. And I’m pretty sure that’s why it’s the only critical flop of the three.
By no measure is Glass an awful movie. It’s full of beautiful, creatively-composed shots and set pieces, and it follows its predecessors’ example by using colour in a variety of ways to tell the story. The actors all do a fantastic job, especially James McAvoy and Samuel L. Jackson. It’s well-written, with relatively few instances of the glaringly awkward dialogue that sometimes creeps into Shyamalan’s movies. And while a few plot points might strain the suspension of disbelief at first glance, to me the story made a lot of sense considering the world in which it takes place.
The problem that I think a lot of audiences will have with this movie is that it doesn’t give us any of the things we’ve come to expect from superheroes. It is certainly the most action-packed film in the trilogy, but that’s not saying much. There are still some long stretches of dialogue and exposition in which not much happens, visually speaking. There certainly aren’t any big CGI-heavy battles or cool futuristic gadgets. Like its predecessors, it’s a fairly quiet, introspective movie that focuses more on what its characters are thinking about than what they’re doing with their fists. And without giving too much away, I think it’s safe to say it doesn’t end like any other superhero film I’ve ever seen.
But I went into this movie as a fan of the other two, not primarily as a fan of superheroes in general. And it gave me pretty much everything I expected and wanted. We get some great insight into the main characters. Casey’s weird relationship with the Horde is developed further, as is the rivalry between Mr. Glass and David Dunn. Mr. Glass and the Horde (more specifically, the Beast) also develop a fascinating relationship. Seeing the original actor back as Joseph was a pleasant surprise, especially since he did an excellent job, and while I didn’t love everything about the psychiatrist character, her presence did add a lot of depth to the world of Unbreakable.
I also thought the movie did a good job wrapping up the themes of the entire trilogy. At their core, all three of these movies are about odd people trying to find their place in the world. The finale provides a fairly satisfying conclusion to their search, while also opening up the possibility for more people in their universe to find the same thing. It’s not the ending I was expecting, but I like it.
My only complaint about the movie–and it is a big one–is its treatment of David Dunn. He’s the protagonist of the first movie in the trilogy, and the only actual superhero in this one (as opposed to a supervillain), so you would think he would be the protagonist, or at least a key character. But he’s really not, especially after the first twenty minutes or so of the movie. The villains (and Casey, to a certain extent) get much more attention and have vastly greater impacts on the plot. On the one hand, I think I can understand why. Jackson and especially MacAvoy are ridiculously talented actors, and their characters are much more entertaining than Bruce Willis’s stoic performance as David. But at the same time, I don’t like cheering for villains, and the fact that the only super-person in this movie who seemed heroic at all got pushed to the sidelines didn’t sit well with me. For all this trilogy’s success so far in avoiding typical superhero movie problems, it ultimately fell to one of the most common: making the villains more interesting than the hero.
Still, if you’re a fan of the previous two movies, I’d still say this one is a must-see. It’s arguably the weakest of the trilogy (although I’d have to see Split again to decide exactly how I rank them), but it’s still a well-made, heartfelt, and highly original superhero movie that is refreshingly different from anything else in theatres right now.
Grade: B+
Wizard at the Clicks 