And I don’t know if I would have followed that if it was a bigger thing. I feel the freedom to be “weird” and have it be “odd” and explore things like this odd humor-tension thing that I’m really interested in right now. And I don’t know if it’s just in my own head. And I feel more freedom with smaller budgets. You know what, it’s always in your own head, you know? And whatever you feel is the reality. With these last two films, which have been made on a smaller budget, have you had more freedom? You’ve certainly seemed happier. This is a Shyamalan who sounds like a filmmaker who’s excited to be making movies again. He sounds like a director who knows he has his control back – and knows what it’s like to lose a lot of that control. This time, Shyamalan is noticeably more upbeat while we speak. Adding anything more at this point would venture into the spoiler category, but suffice it to say, people will be talking about the ending once it’s released. After one of his more nefarious personalities kidnaps three young women, his other personalities debate what to do with them. This month brings Split, a film that has already garnered positive reviews from genre festivals and that is another “smaller” film – this time starring James McAvoy as a person with 23 separate and distinct personalities. (For years I’ve heard admirers of Shyamalan suggest he should make a small film in an effort to get his groove back. In 2015, made on a reported $5 million budget, Shyamalan wrote and directed The Visit – about two teenagers visiting their grandparents – which wound up being a movie that produced his best reviews since 2002’s Signs and grossed just under 20 times its budget worldwide. (If you look back at Shyamalan’s filmography, only Lady in the Water was financially unsuccessful. But after two box office disappointments in a row that would be considered “off brand” (the other is 2010’s The Last Airbender), Shyamalan went back to the drawing board of sorts and essentially rebooted his career with original stories. The good news for Shyamalan is that very few people even realized he directed After Earth.
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