The story is so convoluted and ultimately preposterous that you're almost embarrassed by the earnestness of the actors trying to carry it off.
Comment
07/21/06
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Lady in the Water (2006)
14
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:37
Fresh:5
Rotten:32
Average Rating:3.9/10
Consensus: A far-fetched story with little suspense and unconvincing scenarios, Lady In The Water feels contrived, pretentious, and rather silly.
Theatrical Release:Jul 21, 2006 Wide
Box Office: $42,219,433
Synopsis: M. Night Shyamalan (THE SIXTH SENSE, THE VILLAGE) continues his mission to revive the ancient art of storytelling--which he has diagnosed as a dying art--melding aspects of the fantastic with the... [More]
Starring: Paul Giamatti, Bryce Dallas Howard, Bob Balaban, Jeffrey Wright
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
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Reviews for Lady in the Water
Top CriticIn the end, Shyamalan's stumbling Lady never gives us a reason to believe.
07/21/06
Top CriticCrazy as this might sound, it turns out that self-indulgent ramblings designed to put your children to sleep are pretty much the opposite of art.
07/21/06
Top CriticAn act of spectacular (if unwitting) self-immolation.
07/21/06
Top CriticIt's a busy made-up universe -- with rules, rituals, and a deity-tree that could give the Hindu hierarchy a run for its rupee. And it's extremely silly.
07/21/06
Top CriticViewers may see religious implications in the movie, with its messianic mermaid and chlorinated holy water, but it really isn't worthy of such deep analysis.
07/21/06
Top CriticWith his work beginning to seem as insular as the communities he's imagining, Shyamalan really needs to try directing someone else's screenplay.
07/21/06
Top CriticIt is yet another of Shyamalan's attempts to wade into the deep end of the profundity pool, where not even chlorine can kill the brackish residue of his design.
07/21/06
Top CriticThe movie is a muddle, burdened with too many characters and a sorry lack of thrills, flair and coherence. Yet Shyamalan's talent is real.
07/21/06
Top CriticNot to put too fine a point on it, this is one nutty movie.
07/21/06
Top CriticM. Night Shyamalan doesn't have an ego problem. He's just a humble screenwriter and director who makes himself a star of his own movie -- as a character who is a writer, whose words will save the world from despair and destruction.
07/21/06
Top CriticHey, wanting a movie to compute is not the same as resisting fairy-tale eloquence.
07/21/06
Top CriticLady is not likely to convert critics who believe Shyamalan is only a one-trick pony. Those willing to risk a dip in this pool, on the other hand, may be refreshed, if not reborn.
07/21/06
Top CriticThese days, movie fans have grown accustomed to being force-fed a film's reality, to having it hammered home from first loud frame to last. Lady in the Water offers more subtle submersion, a baptism of soulful quirks and daringly sweet imagination.
07/21/06
Top CriticWho am I to knock the work of the man who, in his own film, casts himself as a writer whose ideas will inspire a future leader who will save the world -- an artist whose work will not be fully understood in his own time, but only many years later?
07/21/06
Top CriticIt is possible to wrestle yourself from the movie's hokey ambitions. There is a good chunk of Lady in the Water that is simply too well made and affectingly acted to dismiss as a mere exercise in arrogance.
07/21/06
Top CriticMurky like the water in the pool, or like Christopher Doyle's cinematography.
07/20/06
Top CriticLady in the Water challenges us to believe in the power of myth. But the big challenge here is surviving the tedium of Shyamalan's meandering inventiveness. What's supposed to be fanciful storytelling is really just audience punishment.
07/20/06
Top CriticThough the result is too idiosyncratic to be regarded as just one more summer-movie whiff, those who see it may feel a need to act like a pool lifeguard and blow the whistle on Shyamalan.
07/20/06
Top CriticIt's hard to think of a deadlier shotgun marriage than Jacques Tourneur's poetry of absence and Spielbergian uplift, but Shyamalan has patented the combo, adding pretentious camera movements that are peculiarly his own -- even the jokes are pretty solemn.
07/20/06
Top CriticLatest News for Lady in the Water
February 05, 2008:
Trailer Bulletin: The Happening
M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening won't reach theaters until June 13, but 20th Century Fox has released its first teaser -- and it's just a click away! More...
March 30, 2007:
Mark Wahlberg to Star in Shyamalan's "Happening"
Retired rapper and underwear model Mark Wahlberg's cinematic hot streak looks set to continue at least into next year: According to Variety, the "Shooter" and... More...
February 27, 2007:
2006 Razzie Awards Announced; "Basic Instinct 2" Leads the Pack
With the arrival of the Oscars comes the stench of the raspberries. The Razzie Awards, of course, which claims to "honor" the very worst of the past year's films ...... More...
January 23, 2007:
Razzie Nominations Announced!
The Golden Raspberry Award Foundation has issued its annual press release announcing the latest batch of Razzie nominees. In an ever-more-crowded field of bad scripts, bad... More...
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