7. M. Night Shyamalan - The Village (2004)
M. Night Shyamalan started a new trend (one that we're still suffering from) when he shot to international fame as the writer and director of
The Sixth Sense, which seems like such a long way from movies like
Lady In The Water and
The Last Airbender that it feels like they were created by two different people. After
Sense, Shyamalan released
Unbreakable, a far quieter movie with a twist ending that wasn't quite so twisty - this was probably a smart move, given that trying to top the shocking finale of
Sense would have been almost impossible. Still, although
Unbreakable (and its follow-up
Signs) both embrace low-key twists and were better for it,
The Village was the movie that pushed things a bit too far: I feel sorry for Shyamalan as it is, given that the studios likely pressured him to write movies built around twists, perhaps even if he didn't want to write them, but
The Village shows the writer/director genuinely clutching for straws. The end of the movie embraces a naff twist for the sheer sake of it, and audiences - once enamoured with this "new Spielberg" - had had enough.
The Village made money, but Shyamalan is considered to be something of a laughing stock today. How far he has fallen.