One of the most divisive and bizarre entities in the world of cinema is M. Night Shyamalan. The one thing everyone can agree on is that he has a very cool name. The one thing no one can agree on is whether he is actually a good director. He is known for a very brief period in the 1990s where he created some excellent work, and then a horrific period in the 2000s in which his output was considered less than stellar.
We’ve compared his five worst films to his five best using IMDb’s user ratings, and there is an exceptional range in the results.
BEST: Signs (6.7)
One of Shyamalan’s many horror films was Signs. It starred Mel Gibson (oh no) and Joaquin Phoenix (oh yes) and was released back in 2002, just before the huge downturn in his career.
Of course, the average response to the film did start to show a side of Shyamalan that was pointing downward, but he managed to keep the tension and twists to a fairly high standard for this film.
WORST: Lady In The Water (5.5)
Considering this film was taken from Shyamalan’s worst filmmaking period, it actually isn’t horrendous. Despite this, it also certainly isn’t good. Bryce Dallas Howard was a strong as ever, but critics particularly hated the way that Shyamalan cast himself in a major role, despite not being a good actor at all.
BEST: Glass (6.7)
Shyamalan was always good at dropping a twist into a film, even when it didn’t make any sense whatsoever. The twist in his 2016 film Split was that it was actually a sequel to Unbreakable.
After the reveal of that, he was free to conclude the trilogy with the star-studded yet lackluster crossover/sequel Glass in 2019. The elements of both a superhero film and a thriller are there, but neither really worked.
WORST: The Happening (5.0)
Another film from Shyamalan’s period of creating seriously disappointing works was The Happening. It started off quite promisingly, with a story of four people trying to our run a natural disaster, before trailing off into more of the incoherent gibberish Shyamalan is so keen on delivering for some reason.
BEST: Unbreakable (7.3)
One of the most impressive Shyamalan films of all time was Unbreakable. Bruce Willis finds out that he is effectively a superhero, and embarks on an exciting, thrilling journey. It turns the superhero genre on its head and has been considered one of the greatest films of the year 2000. Even Tarantino loves it.
WORST: After Earth (4.8)
The amount of embarrassment Will Smith holds in regard to After Earth just about sums up what a disaster his collaboration with his own son was. One of the things Shyamalan couldn’t really do anything about was how awful the co-stars were in their roles, but his directing was also poor, with boring storytelling and strange reliance on Scientology really not helping it out.
BEST: Split (7.3)
In 2016, Shyamalan managed to very slightly redeem himself after a period of truly horrific films in the mid-2000s.
Split was marketed as another of his psychological horror films, but it excelled itself with a twist that had never been attempted before. The twist was that the film was a sequel to Unbreakable, thus gearing his audience up for Glass a few years later. It might not have had much impact on people unfamiliar with Unbreakable, but it’s hard to imagine how exciting that moment must have been to people familiar with the 2000 film.
WORST: Praying With Anger (4.7)
Interestingly, Shyamalan’s second-worst film isn’t actually from his abominable period of filmmaking disasters in the 2000s, but his very first outing as a director. He directed, wrote, produced and starred in Praying With Anger back in 1992. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the low-budget drama received pretty poor reviews across the board.
BEST: The Sixth Sense (8.1)
The one film that has effectively saved Shyamalan from going down in history as one of the worst directors of all time is The Sixth Sense. In fact, it is the genius and skill required to pull off a film of this caliber that is probably still the reason studios have a certain level of faith in him to this day.
It probably has the most well-known twist in cinematic history (aside from “no, I am your father”) and truly grips the audience from start to finish. It is a directorial triumph and when you realize that Shyamalan actually wrote the film himself as well, everything becomes even more impressive.
WORST: The Last Airbender (4.1)
Avatar: The Last Airbender is a franchise loved by many around the world. In 2010, it hit the big screen with Shyamalan at the helm. He also wrote the screenplay. The hype was astounding and the film was a success at the box office. Unfortunately, it happens to be considered one of the worst films ever made. Everything about the film was diabolical, from the storyline full of inconceivable plot holes, the terrible acting from just about everyone involved, the horrible visual effects and what seems like a complete inability to direct a film. A true disaster.