Signs

[SuiteDisney]

Most excellent movie! It was very suspenseful and Mel is aging well! :) It was sad, and tender, and hopeful, and even funny. I can't wait to see it again.

[RitaZ.]

Glad to hear that Mel is aging well!;) ;)

I can't wait to see this movie.

[catsrule]

cool!

[DVCajun]

Does it have a good ending? Happy endings are a must for me. Must be why Disney appeals so strongly. :)

[MineeBaby]

oh oh! i cant wait to go see it!!!! :) im so happy you loved it!

[Jeafl]

Is it appropriate for 6 & 9 year old kids? They really want to see it, and are never bothered by scary movies. I'm just wondering if there is anything I should worry about.

[Lola]

*Hopefully* I'll be seeing it tonite ..

Glad to hear it was good.

[SuiteDisney]

DVCajun, I really liked the ending. :)

Jeafl, this probably isn't a good answer, but it depends on the child. I took my 11 y.o. DD and she wasn't bothered at all. There were younger children in the theater. I think it would be okay for 9 y.o. but I don't know about 6 y.o.

[Grog]

Sound good. I'm going to try to go Sunday :)

[nativetxn]

Can't wait to see this :)

[snoopy]

I'm such a scaredy cat, but I love Mel Gibson so much that I have to go see it. Any opportunity to see an aging-nicely Mel Gibson is one I can't miss. I probably won't sleep for about a month, but I'll be there. :rolleyes:

Thanks for the review, Laura.

[Blondie]

We're seeing it tomorrow afternoon!

[Mamu]

Grandson and I am going next Thursday. I love suspence movies. Although I don't think the people who sit around me are always happy about where there sitting.

Grandson always makes sure there is an empty sit between us.

[Sandy51]

Very scary!! One woman actually screamed out loud!


Sandy

[CathyCanada]

The reviews I have seen loved it! I can't wait to see it!
CC

[SuiteDisney]

Here is Roger Ebert's review:
-------------------------------
SIGNS / **** (PG-13)

August 2, 2002

Father Graham Hess: Mel Gibson
Merrill Hess: Joaquin Phoenix
Morgan Hess: Rory Culkin
Bo Hess: Abigail Breslin
Officer Caroline Paski: Cherry Jones
Colleen Hess: Patricia Kalember
Radio Host: Jose L. Rodriguez
Buena Vista Pictures presents a film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. Running time: 120 minutes. Rated PG-13 (for some frightening moments).

BY ROGER EBERT

M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs" is the work of a born filmmaker, able to summon apprehension out of thin air. When it is over, we think not how little has been decided, but how much has been experienced. Here is a movie in which the plot is the rhythm section, not the melody. A movie that stays free of labored explanations and a forced climax, and is about fear in the wind, in the trees, in a dog's bark, in a little girl's reluctance to drink the water. In signs.

The posters show crop circles, those huge geometric shapes in fields of corn and wheat, which were seen all over the world in the 1970s. Their origin was explained in 1991 when several hoaxers came forward and demonstrated how they made them; it was not difficult, they said. Like many supernatural events, however, crop circles live on after their unmasking, and most people today have forgotten, or never knew, that they were explained. "Signs" uses them to evoke the possibility that ... well, the possibility of anything.

The genius of the film, you see, is that it isn't really about crop circles, or the possibility that aliens created them as navigational aids. I will not even say whether aliens appear in the movie, because whether they do or not is beside the point. The purpose of the film is to evoke pure emotion through the use of skilled acting and direction, and particularly through the soundtrack. It is not just what we hear that is frightening. It is the way Shyamalan has us listening intensely when there is nothing to be heard. I cannot think of a movie where silence is scarier, and inaction is more disturbing.

Mel Gibson stars as Father Graham Hess, who lives on a farm in Bucks County, Pa. We discover he is a priest only belatedly, when someone calls him "Father." "It's not 'Father' anymore," he says. Since he has two children, it takes us a beat to compute that he must be Episcopalian. Not that it matters, because he has lost his faith. The reason for that is revealed midway in the film, a personal tragedy I will not reveal.

Hess lives on the farm with his brother Merrill (Joaquin Phoenix) and his children Morgan and Bo (Rory Culkin and Abigail Breslin). There is an old-fashioned farmhouse and barn, and wide cornfields, and from the very first shot there seems to be something ... out there, or up there, or in there. Hess lives with anxiety gnawing at him. The wind sounds strange. Dogs bark at nothing. There is something wrong. The crop circles do not explain the feelings so much as add to them. He catches a glimpse of something in a corn field. Something wrong.

The movie uses TV news broadcasts to report on events around the world, but they're not the handy CNN capsules that supply just what the plot requires. The voices of the anchors reveal confusion and fear. A video taken at a birthday party shows a glimpse of the most alarming thing. "The history of the world's future is on TV right now," Morgan says.

In a time when Hollywood mistakes volume for action, Shyamalan makes quiet films. In a time when incessant action is a style, he persuades us to play close attention to the smallest nuances. In "The Sixth Sense" (1999) he made a ghost story that until the very end seemed only to be a personal drama--although there was something there, some buried hint, that made us feel all was not as it seemed. In "Unbreakable" (2000) he created a psychological duel between two men, and it was convincing even though we later discovered its surprising underlying nature, and all was redefined.

In "Signs," he does what Hitchcock said he liked to do, and plays the audience like a piano. There is as little plot as possible, and as much time and depth for the characters as he can create, all surrounded by ominous dread. The possibility of aliens is the catalyst for fear, but this family needs none, because it has already suffered a great blow.

Instead of flashy special effects, Shyamalan creates his world out of everyday objects. A baby monitor that picks up inexplicable sounds. Bo's habit of leaving unfinished glasses of water everywhere. Morgan's bright idea that caps made out of aluminum foil will protect their brains from alien waves. Hess' use of a shiny kitchen knife, not as a weapon, but as a mirror. The worst attack in the film is Morgan's asthma attack, and his father tries to talk him through it, in a scene that sets the entire movie aside and is only about itself.

At the end of the film, I had to smile, recognizing how Shyamalan has essentially ditched a payoff. He knows, as we all sense, that payoffs have grown boring. The mechanical resolution of a movie's problems is something we sit through at the end, but it's the setup and the buildup that keep our attention. "Signs" is all buildup. It's still building when it's over.

[Mary Jo]

<font color=navy>We just got home from seeing Signs. I think Ebert gave an excellent review.

All three of us give it six thumbs up, and my heart is still beating - an hour after the movie ended!

I asked the rascals if they thought it would be too intense for a 6 & 9 yr old and they both said yes, but then Nick (14) said that it depends on the child. I would say that parents should preview and then they'd be better able to judge how their kids would react to the movie.

It was a good one, and really built up the suspense. We had some teens behind us (slightly annoying), and those girls screamed a lot -- reminded me of me when I was that age. :)

[TeresaNJ]

DH and I just got home from seeing Signs, and we both liked it very much. It was very hot and humid when we went in to see the movie, and very blustery with very eerie flashes of lightening in the night sky when we left. Needless to say, I looked in the back seat and under the car before I got in, LOL. I'm still looking over my shoulder. It was a very creepy, scary movie in an Alfred Hitchcock sort of way. I'll be leaving my closet door open tonight!

[WDWfanatic288]

I got home like 2 hours ago and loved it!! it was very good!!

for people that saw the movie-did you notice the motif of blue everywhere? I did! and my friend and I finally figured out what it meant!(just like in 6th sense where there was red everywhere)

hehe! I went with a bunch of my friends and I was hanging on to my best friend Eric for dear life! and then at a scary part I screamed and he screamed 3 times as loud as me...so I do this high pitched scream and then he goes and does it louder :rolleyes:
then the next time we both screamed again! LOL!
and there was one time he screamed by himself! lol
and he was talking the entire time...he had me cracking up! lol at the funny parts he did this ghetto laugh...haha!

omg! it's SOOOO alfread hitchock...I watched The Birds last week and it was like that! I was like NOOOO!

so now I have a fear of showers,birds and corn fields :rolleyes:

[Kallison]

We saw it last night with my 12 year old DS. We all decided that it was a good thing the 9 year old DS didn't come along. We both had my sweater over our heads. DH did not like it, it was too subtle for him. The whole theater cheered when it said Somewhere in Bucks County, although you couldn't tell much from the scenes. I watched the day they filmed the bookstore scene and saw the two little kids and the old man, plus M. Night. I did not notice the blue motif, I'll have to watch it again. We went to the 5pm show and there were no small kids at all. I would think twice, even if they are ok with overtly scary stuff like Buffy or Halloween. It was also lightning in PA when we got out, some storm and we live next to a cornfield - it was spooooooky.

[Lola]

I saw it and loved it .. up until the end. LOL We thought it was kinda cheesy .. But I won't say anything, I don't wanna ruin it hehe.

I didn't scream .. just gasped lol .. but the lady sitting two people next to me FREAKED out the entire movie.

[TigerBear]

My dh and I just saw this one. Signs is definitely a very different type of alien movie. I don't think it would be very appropriate for children under 10 (at least). In some ways it is more a movie about self-discovery (or rediscovery) than about the actual Aliens plot. It is probably the most dramatic alien movie ever filmed and is absolutely nothing like Men in Black, Aliens, or Independence Day...definitely more like The Sixth Sense. Two thumbs up from the household (although there were times in the movie when I really questioned the character's decisions).

[Tinkbell]

I saw it last night and loved it. However, you can consider me FREAKED OUT.:earseek: I keep reliving the scene where Mel sees "something" on top of the barn from his house. I live on the second floor of a two story home and my kitchen window looks directly out onto the roof of the garage. Let's just say the curtains will be closed for a few days.:D I'll also never look at baby monitors the same way.

I would NOT take a six year old because if I saw this when I was 6, I probably wouldn't recover. It is a very creepy kind of scary. It's not gore, blood and violence, but it is very creepy.