Glass
A review by Azzam Abdur-Rahman
I probably was the wrong person to review this film. It’s not that I dislike M. Night or his filmography but I do wonder if this was the right choice. Split succeeded for being a film that had limited scope and direct focus. Glass on paper seemed to me like a brave choice but arguably a foolish one. Unbreakable has had a cult classic status for a decade. If there is anything I have learned in this lifetime, things like that create expectations which leaves artists working against the film fans have imagined in their minds. A thankless task.
Glass is what happens when a director decides to not only ignore what fans want but make a film that no one exactly asked for. Instead of an interesting thriller building off of that very grounded world of the previous films, we got a strange dramatic deconstruction of the superhero film and its effect on culture.
First let me shout out what is good about this movie. The acting is sold but Jackson is really doing work. We often forget how amazing Jackson is as a working actor because he is comfortable taking on so many roles in so many genres but lets not forget Jackson is never bad. Willis is ok. Pretty much doing his classic look. The people who deserve all the joy are Sarah Paulson and James McAvoy. McAvoy is completely slept on as an actor. I don’t know why because this guy is taking the role from Split and building off of what is already an insanely hard character to work. On the other side of that coin Sarah Paulson deserves bigger roles. This woman has been doing thankless work for years. She takes roles that are absolute wastes of time and elevates them often. Her character in this film is a joke but she does everything to give it weight. Also big shout outss to the cinematography and set design which I dug heavy but those are the only things I can speak highly of! The writing/plot is absolutely insane! When I first started this film I thought “Holy shit he did it!” and then out of nowhere he starts an academic dissertation on mythology, the failures of society, and I start to wonder “did the success of The Visit and Split get to his head!” Because this film screams of his later works where you could tell Shyamalan lost track of his skills and let his ego get to him again. The concepts are interesting and as someone who wrote a whole article on superhero films I should like this but I think he lost the forest for the trees. The concepts and plot collapse under the weight of asking the question are superheroes good for society. Now don’t let my negative review keep you from seeing this if you are invested in this franchise. If you aren’t then don’t see this. Watch it later on some streaming service or premium channel platform. Movies like this shouldn’t be rewarded for asking questions especially if the questions they ask don’t have clear answers. Glass is a waste of time. It’s a waste of a decade. It’s a waste of hype but most importantly it was a waste of money.
0/5
First let me shout out what is good about this movie. The acting is sold but Jackson is really doing work. We often forget how amazing Jackson is as a working actor because he is comfortable taking on so many roles in so many genres but lets not forget Jackson is never bad. Willis is ok. Pretty much doing his classic look. The people who deserve all the joy are Sarah Paulson and James McAvoy. McAvoy is completely slept on as an actor. I don’t know why because this guy is taking the role from Split and building off of what is already an insanely hard character to work. On the other side of that coin Sarah Paulson deserves bigger roles. This woman has been doing thankless work for years. She takes roles that are absolute wastes of time and elevates them often. Her character in this film is a joke but she does everything to give it weight. Also big shout outss to the cinematography and set design which I dug heavy but those are the only things I can speak highly of! The writing/plot is absolutely insane! When I first started this film I thought “Holy shit he did it!” and then out of nowhere he starts an academic dissertation on mythology, the failures of society, and I start to wonder “did the success of The Visit and Split get to his head!” Because this film screams of his later works where you could tell Shyamalan lost track of his skills and let his ego get to him again. The concepts are interesting and as someone who wrote a whole article on superhero films I should like this but I think he lost the forest for the trees. The concepts and plot collapse under the weight of asking the question are superheroes good for society. Now don’t let my negative review keep you from seeing this if you are invested in this franchise. If you aren’t then don’t see this. Watch it later on some streaming service or premium channel platform. Movies like this shouldn’t be rewarded for asking questions especially if the questions they ask don’t have clear answers. Glass is a waste of time. It’s a waste of a decade. It’s a waste of hype but most importantly it was a waste of money.
0/5
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