Well, this is a big goddam disappointment. Glass is a sequel to both Unbreakable and Split and, since Unbreakable came out in 2000, M. Night Shyamalan has had 19 years to think about how to resolve this series (fun fact: Split was originally just a subplot in Unbreakable, but was cut from the script for length). And I was excited about what Shyamalan was going to do with this. In my review of Split, I said that “I am honestly more interested in the movie that this sets up than I am in this movie.” Sorry, 2017-me, but you are going to be mighty disappointed in 2 years. Of all of the possible ways to continue this series and expand on expand on this mythology, Shyamalan chose possibly the most boring route imaginable. And, regardless of how you feel about Unbreakable and Split, that is this film’s biggest crime: It is just fucking boring.
The first 20 minutes are pretty much what I was hoping to get out of this movie. Bruce Willis’ character from Unbreakable (now dubbed The Overseer) is hunting down James McAvoy’s character from Split (now named The Horde). The Overseer tracks down The Horde, a battle ensues and I started wondering why all of this was happening inside the first half hour of the film. Damn short movie, perhaps. But no, they are both caught by police (even though they could have easily fought through them), arrested and taken to a mental hospital where they are joined by Mr. Glass (Samuel L. Jackson’s character from Unbreakable). And this, boys and girls, is where this film falls to shit. The remaining 90 minutes are tedious scenes of the three characters being interviewed and studied by hospital staff until we finally get to a series of plot twists that should have even given Shyamalan pause.
Boring and asinine is not a formula for a good movie. Shyamalan seems so intent on making a “grounded” superhero movie that he effectively reminds us why superhero movies would never work in the real world. This movie is so fucking meta that it doesn’t even like itself. If his intent was to illustrate why this genre doesn’t work in reality, then he succeeded. Yes, in real life people that think they have superpowers would end up in a mental hospital. That doesn’t make it a compelling basis for a film, rather it’s a reason why such stories should be removed from reality. Did you want to see The Overseer pitted in battle against Mr. Glass and The Horde? Well, fuck you because instead you are getting agonizingly long scenes of psycho-analysis where a psychiatrist tries to convince these characters that they are just delusional. That might even be compelling if they were, in fact, delusional. But they aren’t. Why Bruce Willis doesn’t just tear his handcuffs to prove his powers, I have no idea. Maybe that would deprive us of these riveting group therapy sessions.
I’m not going to give spoilers, but the ending of the film is just goddamn ridiculous. One plot twist is just contrived convenience and the last twist is such a stupid, desperate attempt to place this in a larger context that I was just dumbfounded by what I saw. If you are stealing a plot twist from Halloween 6, then you are fucking doing it wrong. I want to say much more but I also don’t want to spoil things, so I need you to watch this for yourself and then we can discuss the ludicrous bullshit that is the last 20 minutes of this movie.
As a saving grace, the performances are great all around. James McAvoy was the highlight of Split and the man’s ability to switch between personalities is still an absolute marvel. Samuel L. Jackson is great, even if his character isn’t given as much to do as he should, and even Willis doesn’t appear to be phoning it in for the first time in years. The film also returns several supporting characters from both Unbreakable and Split. None of them have much to do and could easily have been written out of the film, but Anya Taylor Joy’s presence is a highlight (she’s a pretty, pretty lady). Sarah Paulson has the thankless task of playing the psychiatrist and her character grinds the film to a mind-numbing halt, but that’s not the fault of her performance. Everyone here really is giving their best and seems to care about this material, it’s just too bad that the material is such an insufferable bore.
I’m not sure what Shyamalan was trying to do here. This movie is like a middle finger to people that were looking for a resolution to the previous films and an unnecessary lecture for people that like comic books. Glass is more of a study of the impracticality of superhero movies than it is a superhero movie. In other words, it’s a film that doesn’t need to exist because we know that superheroes couldn’t work the same way in the real world. I didn’t need this dull, pretentious diatribe to explain to me that superhero movies are just fantasy. Glass is a boring, cynical film that seemingly only exists to suck the fun out of its own genre.
Image By: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_(2019_film)#/media/File:Glass_(2019_poster).png
