Unbreakable - Special Edition

The fragility of the human condition is rarely addressed as often as human superiority or hidden wells of strength are. In this second major film from M. Night Shyamalan – his first being the massive hit The Sixth Sense - he addresses just that fragility and the delicateness of the mind under duress.

When an interstate train derails and is hit by another, only two people survive; one with massive injuries, the other without a scratch. When the first dies, that leaves the scratch-free David Dunn as the sole survivor. Unnerved and disoriented by this amazing quirk of luck, Dunn is approached by a strange fellow we have met in the earliest moments of the film. Samuel L. Jackson plays Elijah Price, a man with a disorder that prevents his bones becoming as durable as the average person's. Survivor himself of many, many breaks, Elijah came to realise through comic books that perhaps there was someone on the other end of the spectrum he appeared to be on; someone who was 'unbreakable'.

Soon the two are discussing the possibilities and Dunn, an average fellow with an inexplicable sadness, begins to discover amazing qualities of which he was unaware. After Dunn utilises his bizarre newfound powers he begins to question everything in his life, particularly his relationship with Elijah and things can never remain the same.

"They say this one has a surprise ending..."

Told with a precision for detail so often overlooked by mainstream Hollywood, Unbreakable itself bears the appearance of a comic book. With this comic book theme threaded skillfully throughout the piece, Shyamalan tells the story with unusual camera moves, strange angles and in reflections. This correlates with the kids’ nickname for Elijah – Mr Glass. In fact, glass is used everywhere as a metaphor for the disastrous life Elijah has led. So often shots are reflected in TV sets, framed artworks, mirrors or gym windows. Elijah himself carries a glass cane that is used as a brilliant allusion to the frailty of his bones, particularly during a shot as he stumbles down a long staircase. As noted, Shyamalan uses many comic book devices within the film. In a busy train station with hundreds of people milling about, he picks out individuals with garish swathes of colour in their garments. Orange overalls, a red coat. His use of such tools creates a slightly skewiff view of the world we live in, one that comic books reflect so easily in their pages of bright colours and exaggerated action. As the major theme of the film, Shyamalan has focused strongly on the comic and its attributes, blending them seamlessly into his vision of the world portrayed here.

Another tool he employs to skilful effect is the ‘mystery shot’. This features something happening in a scene that we can’t see until the scene ends, much like a comic book will introduce the speaker after three or four panels, or in darkness or silhouette. A man talks with David from behind an open locker door. David is lying on his bed reading the paper and as he puts it down, we see his adoring son with his arms around him. These and others add lustre to the running theme, maintaining it for the duration of the film.

One other major note of fact is the extraordinary amount of long shots and single takes for scenes in this film. Upwards of 30 scenes in which a lot of well-choreographed action takes place, keeping up the long panel feel utilised in comics for depth of field and atmosphere. It is something truly luxurious, no doubt, for a director who is also producer and writer, to play with while making a film yet Shyamalan never overuses his creative freedom, making it work only for the benefit of his creation . Visually amazing and enormously intriguing, Unbreakable is a well designed production that starts slowly and builds suspense until the final conclusion, without feeling the need to pander to the comic book geeks or wallow in unnecessary praise of the industry.

In the full cinema aspect of 2.35:1 and anamorphically enhanced, this film looks amazing. Whilst certainly not perfect, Buena Vista have nevertheless delivered a trademark transfer of fantastic video quality. Sharp lines and well-saturated colours fill out the screen well and all blacks are true and full. Shadows, however, do lean a little toward murky and lose some detail in instances, but are mostly okay. Flesh tones, which run nearly the full human spectrum in this film, all look well shadowed and even.

In a film about comic books, you wouldn’t think sound would matter so much, but when you add the creepy levels of suspense familiar to Shyamalan fans, it matters a lot. Luckily, the sound is dynamite throughout this film. Presented in Dolby Digital Surround 5.1, it brings the film to life with amazing clarity. There’s a scene set in heavy rain at 1:10:00 that sounds absolutely superb. I was more mesmerised by that sound than the film for a whole 30 seconds, easily. It took me back to growing up on the farm when rain would come down in boatloads on the corrugated iron roof and you couldn’t hear yourself thinking; like you were inside the sound itself. Amazing quality, just awesome.

The first disc features just the movie and nothing else, so everything here is just on Disc Two.

The first offering is a multi-angle sequence that runs for four minutes. This is the train station scene and I was expecting camera angles of the same scene, but no, what we get is the final scene with an ability to flick back to the storyboard and check it against the final shots. Even the fact that Shyamalan drew the storyboard doesn’t make this any better (and the drawings are rough as anything). A fairly mundane effort to start with, which isn’t good, but to its credit, it does have three soundtracks: Just sound effects, just music or the film's whole soundtrack. Even so...

Deleted scenes introduced and discussed by Shyamalan come next and run for 27 and a half minutes. These are okay, but the director’s input is more interesting still, particularly in his reference to the hardest scene to shoot in the whole film and its eventual removal. These are all delivered in 1.85:1 and enhanced, surprisingly.

Another surprise is the 1.78:1 aspect with enhancement of a behind the scenes featurette with Bruce Willis. This is the usual rather average phuff and Bruce Willis hardly hosts it - that’s a bit of a misnomer on the slick. Samuel L. Jackson’s hosting of the featurette entitled Comic Books and Superheroes, however, is very interesting (and not just because I’m in comics). This includes interviews with some notable industry names including Will Eisner, Scott McCloud, Alex Ross and Trina Robbins. It runs for 18 and half minutes.

Lastly, there are the standard issue theatrical trailer, presented in 1.85:1 and not enhanced, and then the doozy of the whole extras batch. This is in the shape of an excerpt from one of Shyamalan’s childhood filmmaking efforts and is absolutely hilarious! I laughed so hard, because it’s so awful. Shyamalan himself introduces this and the way he speaks of it, he expects people to laugh too. You gotta respect someone willing to do that to themselves.

So all up a rather mixed bag and one that doesn’t quite make the most of being a separate disc. Surely they could have done more to justify this being a twofer? In fact, this could all have been crammed onto one I think. Oh well. It’s still good, just not great.

Shyamalan’s Unbreakable is a film that while having fingerprints similar to his other two major efforts (Sixth Sense and Signs) is still vastly different. Haunting yet amusing and thought provoking without being pretentious, this is an interesting expedition into the psyche and the enormous price of being different. Told with a curious blend of warmth and coldness and at times disjointed and seemingly unconnected (like a comic book) this is a movie that will stand up to multiple viewings while still remaining absorbing. This will happily sit with the other Shyamalan films in your collection, with its only real flaw being the wasted space of two discs when one would have done the same job.