The Sixth Sense is one of the few recent Hollywood films that lingers in my memory. Sadly, a new book about director M. Night Shyamalan doesn't paint him in the most flattering light:
What emerges through the haze of hagiography is a study in egomania and insecurity—the artist as pathetic prima donna, whose "Oscar nominations and his money and his farm and his beautiful wife and his adorable girls" aren't enough to keep him from pitching a fit when a Disney executive puts off reading his script to take her son to a birthday party. If you hate Shyamalan's movies, "The Man Who Heard Voices" will leave you feeling vindicated; if you like them, you'll find yourself wishing that you didn't.
Oh dear, another reputation bites the dust. But at least he's no hack:
Shyamalan... doesn't make sequels or franchises (he turned down a chance to script Indiana Jones IV). He doesn't adapt Dan Brown best sellers, or Robert Ludlum potboilers, or Disney theme-park rides. He doesn't rely on CGI, or even use it much—and while he seems to love comic books as much as any of his Marvel and DC-adapting peers, his own superhero movie, "Unbreakable", did something different and more interesting.
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