10 Directors Suffering From George Lucas Syndrome

3. M. Night Shyamalan

His Success: M. Night Shyamalan's career exploded at the mere age of 29 when he directed his third movie, The Sixth Sense, earning him two Oscar nominations (for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay) alongside critical acclaim and a huge box office haul. His other hits include Unbreakable and Signs, while The Village, The Happening and The Last Airbender all made significant profits despite being destroyed by critics. His Failures: His abject, unambiguous failures began to abound around the time of The Village, where audiences began to realise that Shyamalan was pretty much just a one-trick pony who relied too heavily on improbable plot twists. His follow-up The Lady in the Water bombed, The Happening and The Last Airbender were trashed despite commercial success, and the Will Smith-starring action adventure flick After Earth was a bust in every way a movie can be. Shyamalan suffers from dual "diseases": he not only had too much money thrown at him while audiences simply expected more of the same brilliance that came before (Lucas Syndrome), but he also peaked far too early and was never able to live up to that early success (popularly known as Orson Welles Syndrome). With his last five movies being flops in one way, another or both, it seems like he just doesn't care anymore, and given how studios are even downplaying his involvement in their movies, it's really not looking good for him at all. How He Can Save His Career: Ditch the big budgets and try something more down to Earth. To Shyamalan's credit, his upcoming comedy horror film The Visit sounds like his most interesting movie in years: it cost just $5 million to make, features no A-list stars, and if it's remotely decent, then it could be the director's most unexpected success in quite some time. If this one can't score better reviews than his excessive blockbuster films, then he'll probably end up on the straight-to-video s***-list before you know it.
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Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.