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GLASS (2019) MOVIE NEWS & REVIEW

GLASS (2019) movie

Genre | Science Fiction

Classification | MA 15+

Running time | TBA minutes

Released | 17 January 2019

cast

Bruce Willis ... David Dunn
James McAvoy ... Kevin Wendell Crumb / The Beast / Patricia / Dennis / Hedwig / Barry / Jade / Orwell / Heinrich / Norma
Samuel L. Jackson ... Elijah Price / Mr. Glass
Anya Taylor-Joy ... Casey Cooke
Sarah Paulson ... Dr. Ellie Staple

director

M. Night Shyamalan

writer

M. Night Shyamalan ... (written by)

cinematographer

Mike Gioulakis

music

West Dylan Thordson

film editor

Luke Ciarrocchi
Blu Murray

box office result

Worldwide $? million

Australia $? million

North America $? million

the best dialogue

Dr. Ellie Staple: It's amazing to meet you. It is simply extraordinary. Maybe this will all make sense if I explain who I am. My name is Dr. Ellie Staple, and I'm a psychiatrist. My work concerns a particular type of delusion of grandeur. It's a growing field. I specialize in those individuals who believe they are superheroes.
Kevin Wendell Crumb: [to David] Good for you.

David Dunn: I'm in security.

Elijah Price: First name: Mister. Last name: Glass.

GLASS (2019) MOVIE IMAGES

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GLASS (2019) STORY SYNOPSIS

M. Night Shyamalan brings together the narratives of two of his standout originals—2000’s Unbreakable, from Touchstone, and 2016’s Split, from Universal—in one explosive, all-new comic-book thriller: Glass. From Unbreakable, Bruce Willis returns as David Dunn as does Samuel L. Jackson as Elijah Price, known also by his pseudonym Mr. Glass. Joining from Split are James McAvoy, reprising his role as Kevin Wendell Crumb and the multiple identities who reside within, and Anya Taylor-Joy as Casey Cooke, the only captive to survive an encounter with The Beast. Following the conclusion of Split, Glass finds Dunn pursuing Crumb’s superhuman figure of The Beast in a series of escalating encounters, while the shadowy presence of Price emerges as an orchestrator who holds secrets critical to both men.

GLASS (2019) MOVIE REVIEW

Reviewed by Mark Geraghty | Review date 16 January 2019

Pop Movee Rating

GLASS is not the film many may have hoped for, as M. Night Shyamalan continues his career comeback, working hard to string together consecutive creative and commercial successes at the box office...

With an all-star cast and a mythology built around two of Shyamalan’s most successful endeavours, GLASS fulfils some of its potential. It runs off the road with its creator’s insistence upon overtly stating the comic book archetypes in play throughout the course of its 129 minute running time.

Despite being in a vegetative state for the better half of his screen time, Samuel L. Jackson, returning as the titular villain Mr. Glass, is the principal perpetrator of this explicit exposition and seems unable to prevent himself from lapsing into explanation after explanation as the film’s finale unfolds.

The rather large caveat to Jackson’s performance lies in the viewer’s understanding of comic book archetypes. In a world where popular culture pivots on the strength of one Marvel movie to the next, it’s easy to think most moviegoers have a pretty good understanding of how comic book inspired movies should unfold.

Shyamalan doesn’t make this assumption…

It raises the thought as to whether or not he thinks his audience are slow on the uptake or lack the interest to pay attention to what’s going on as events unfold. Given the audience for GLASS is, more-than-likely, already invested in both UNBREAKABLE and SPLIT, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to give them a little bit of credit and make them engage with their intellect a little more by by not relying on overt statements at critical dramatic moments to connect the story’s plot points!

Unfortunately, the film’s finale is hobbled by the need to qualify every action with such overt statements clarifying plot points and not even the “Shyamalan Twist” that closes out GLASS has the power to suggest anything other than Shyamalan needs to S-P-E-L-L it out for the viewer. The end product is an anticlimactic ending that fails to satisfy either the David Dunn/Elijah Price or the Kevin Wendell Crumb/Casey Cooke mythologies.

GLASS is by no means a disaster…

Shyamalan manages to tease solid performances from his three leading men.

The appearance of Bruce Willis, as UNBREAKABLE character David Dunn, at the end of SPLIT was a great surprise and placed the events of that film in a much broader context than viewers would have suspected walking in to see the film for the first time.

Willis has been portrayed over the years as a person who has a low tolerance level for the extraneous frivolities of celebrity and has doubled-down on his career. Not every film he appears in is a hit, but he has reinvented himself to become a great character actor prepared to trade-off his “Star” reputation for the greater good of a film. To a large extent, his initial association with Shyamalan was the catalyst for this change…

In both UNBREAKABLE and THE SIXTH SENSE, Willis moved away from the big-budget, action driven blockbuster films that he was associated with in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Audiences came to appreciate that Willis was a much better actor than some of the characters he had played in the movies he had headlined would give him credit for.

The character of Malcolm Crowe in THE SIXTH SENSE changed audience perceptions of Willis. The twist-ending of the film itself was a big enough shock, but, repeated viewings of that film show just how nuanced and disciplined Willis could be when given the right material. Willis has Shyamalan to thank for writing the character and crafting a film that gave viewers a chance to see Willis play such a different role.

In GLASS, David Dunn hasn’t really fulfilled the potential his character possessed at the end of UNBREAKABLE. He’s more like a version of the Paul Kersey character he played in Eli Roth’s downbeat, blood-thirsty 2018 DEATH WISH remake. Dunn now stalks the street of Philadelphia acting like a low-budget vigilante, his shadowy appearance in that trademark raincoat a sign to petty criminals that they’re about to get a monumental ass whipping.

Set three weeks after the events of SPLIT, with the help of his son Joseph, a now grown-up Spencer Treat Clark reprising his role from the 2000 film, Dunn is in search of Kevin Wendell Crumb, who, despite the escape of one his previous victims, has managed to abduct and hold captive another four teenage girls in an abandoned warehouse.

In comparison to the low-key Dunn, James McAvoy gets another opportunity to chew the scenery as Crumb’s multiple personalities emerge throughout various points of the story. Besides Kevin, Shyamalan distills the other personalities down, focussing predominantly upon Patricia, Hedwig, Dennis and The Beast. Of all the personalities that exist within Crumb, it is The Beast that receives the most attention. Shyamalan develops The Beast into a genuine character with his own desires and agenda, providing Dunn with a foe whose physical power is equal to his own.

Unlike SPLIT, where he was the leading performer, GLASS doesn’t rely entirely upon McAvoy to drive the story. This frees him to perform each of Kevin’s personalities in a more exaggerated manner, delivering his lines with a little more twisted relish each time a personality emerges. Every time he appears on screen, McAvoy certainly livens up the dynamic.

In addition to Willis, McAvoy and Jackson, Anya Taylor-Joy reprises her SPLIT role as Casey Cooke, the sole survivor of an encounter with The Beast. Shyamalan makes an effort to continue the exploration of the uncertainty Casey experienced at the end of that film in relation to her feelings for Kevin, however, this plot element seems forced and the random appearance of her character throughout the story wreaks of contrivance. Taylor-Joy does the best she can with a part that seems superfluous for the majority of the film.

AMERICAN HORROR STORY actress Sarah Paulson plays Ellie Staple, the lead Doctor at a medical facility specialising in certain types of mental illness. Staple is convinced that Dunn, Crumb and Price all suffer from the same condition, where they believe they are imbued with superpowers much like a comic book character. Staple tries to make them see sense and prove to them that their belief in their powers is misguided and dangerous.

Paulson never feels like she’s quite on top of her character and her performance is pretty flat. In an effort to be a calming influence, her line delivery is monotone. During the film’s finale, she lacks energy and Staple never has the sense of urgency one might expect of a medical professional whose treatment facility has become a war zone!

Perhaps, though, Staple doesn’t quite understand what she has waded into...

Behind every devious plot is an evil criminal mastermind!

Samuel L. Jackson’s Mr. Glass certainly fits the bill in GLASS, but, as comic book audiences know, appearances can be deceiving…

As the finale unfolds, much of what the viewer has come to believe, suddenly, comes into question…

Is the hero a villain?

Is the villain a hero?

If it were not for the Third Act expository overload, Shyamalan could have - quite possibly - pulled off his best twist ever.

GLASS is not the crescendo of a great trilogy. It never matches the understated ambience of UNBREAKABLE and it lacks the suspense of SPLIT. Shyamalan has already played his cards for both of those films and, consequently, GLASS becomes reliant upon multiple Shyamalan plot twists for the audience to be satisfied with its outcome. Some of these make sense, but others feel forced.

Unfortunately, there’s not quite enough payoff in the denouement after a collective 352 minutes over the course of three movies for the viewer to feel completely satisfied that Shyamalan has succeeded in what he set out to achieve in a story spanning nearly two decades.