Glass

2019 superhero movie

Rating: 9/20

Plot: The three guy from Unbreakable and Split wind up in a hospital where a doctor tries to cure them of their delusions that they have superhuman abilities.

M. Night's back to Shammalammadingdonging his way through movies again. At least anything you could call a twist in this movie--this particular big twist is telegraphed from about a Beast hop, skip, and jump away--fits in thematically although the whole thing is so gummy that interest and momentum are lost fairly early on. By the time the big reveal hits and all the pieces come together, it's difficult to care what happens to Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, or James McAvoy.

Jackson probably gives the best performance of the three, but that might only be because he doesn't have a lot to do. Willis is as dispirited as he has been in this recent part of his career, and McAvoy's a total distraction. His is a big, flashy, show-off performance, and you get the sense that both he and Shyamalan are really pleased with themselves. McAvoy plays his characters in a way that says, "Hey! Look at me and what I can do!" and Shyamalan gives him all these artificial opportunities to showcase the various personalities because he thinks he's some sort of genius for even creating the character.

M. Night, because he thinks he's the reincarnation of Alfred Hitchcock, gives himself a really pointless extended cameo. It made me feel sorry for him.

The whole thing is just so hammy, and the comic meta-commentary is really clumsy. Characters might as well look directly at the audience and explain the parallels to you. In fact, I think one of them does that at one point. A bunch of things happen after a long period of time when not-much-at-all happens, and then things end and then end again and you think a little about the struggle between the remarkable and unremarkable or logic and the imagination but mostly wonder why a trio of characters are sitting where they happen to be sitting, realizing that it's yet another Shammalammadingdongian attempt to show off how clever he is.

I laughed out loud when McAvoy said "Hey" at one point in this. It's possible that the humor was intended, but I just don't know. I mean, I'm the guy who thought The Visit was a straight comedy.