When the little known filmmaker known as “Night” came on the scene in 1999 with the film The Sixth Sense, most were in awe at not only the Indian-American’s storytelling ability, but particularly the twist ending, which would become his filmmaking trademark.
Yet M. Night Shyamalan takes a bit of a hiatus from his typical filmmaking style with his most recent film The Last Airbender, which opens nationwide on Friday.
Shyamalan had for some time been seeking out a larger story to tell.
“I’d love to do a large-scale story, something larger than my normal thrillers,” said Shyamalan.
“And so the edict was to the agents [to] find me Harry Potter before it becomes Harry Potter, find me one of these movies, find me Jurassic Park in a manuscript form… and it turns out my 7 year old that brought me the property.”
After avoiding his daughter’s constant plea’s to join her in watching the series Avatar: The Last Airbender, Shyamalan finally gave in. He became an instant fan, and also had found his large-scale story.
Airbender would become Shyamalan’s fictional epic tale which bears the likes of a Lord of the Rings or Star Wars.
The film is set in a fictional world and centers on a young brother and sister, Katara (Nicola Peltz) and Sokka (Jackson Rathbone) who discover the last avatar.
To the non-anime series watching fans, “bending” is the ability to manipulate one of the four elements of as water, fire, air, and earth; and the Avatar is the one who can manipulate all four elements.
And while the well known director can help to manipulate the script, the characters, and the elements that dart and flash on the screen, his ability to stray away from controversy is not as refined.
Several advocacy groups began to protest and call for a boycott of the film after the cast was revealed to be far more Caucasian than the animated series and far less Asian.
Yet Night cuts the tension with laughter and a joke…
“The great news is I am Asian!”
And he slides back into a serious tone.
“Anime is an art form based on ambiguous facial features—it is part of the art form. You got a problem with that, talk to the [guys] who invented anime. That girl looks like my daughter, that boy looks like Noah [the central character], there is no Inuit that looks like Katara” exclaims Shyamalan. “This wasn’t an agenda for me.”
Despite the criticism, the film has a fairly diverse cast, a process that Shyamalan enjoyed assembling.
“The casting of the movie was a really wonderful opportunity to make a world of nationalities that I was excited about.”
“Diverse, diverse, its one of the great assets and the subject matter that it was borrowing from all cultures, Indian, Thai, Japanese, every single culture was borrowed from in the background in the show.”
Slumdog star Dev Patel, was little known at the time of Shyamalan’s casting calls, yet Patel stood out as a finalist.
“There was this kid in London who tried out, and I was like this kid, he killed this audition but I was like there is no way I can cast this guy. And [then] I was like, could I?”
“And then Slumdog [Millionaire]” came out and I was like man, and I called up Paramount and I was like is this crazy… but this kid should play this prince that is completely too sweet and too soft for his dad who thinks he should be ruthless.”
“We had him come in.. and I was like this is the guy.”
As for the rising criticism over the years regarding his films and filmmaking ability, Shyamalan applauds it.
“It’s a compliment when everybody is up my a**…They are trying dissect you to show you why you re not that great, which is wonderful thing for them to try to do.
“My job is to just keep making movies and [the criticism will] go away or I will prove them right or wrong. Time will tell…and I am fine with that.”
“In the end your critics are you hard teachers and its good to be tough on yourself.”
Yet M. Night Shyamalan takes a bit of a hiatus from his typical filmmaking style with his most recent film The Last Airbender, which opens nationwide on Friday.
Shyamalan had for some time been seeking out a larger story to tell.
“I’d love to do a large-scale story, something larger than my normal thrillers,” said Shyamalan.
“And so the edict was to the agents [to] find me Harry Potter before it becomes Harry Potter, find me one of these movies, find me Jurassic Park in a manuscript form… and it turns out my 7 year old that brought me the property.”
After avoiding his daughter’s constant plea’s to join her in watching the series Avatar: The Last Airbender, Shyamalan finally gave in. He became an instant fan, and also had found his large-scale story.
Airbender would become Shyamalan’s fictional epic tale which bears the likes of a Lord of the Rings or Star Wars.
The film is set in a fictional world and centers on a young brother and sister, Katara (Nicola Peltz) and Sokka (Jackson Rathbone) who discover the last avatar.
To the non-anime series watching fans, “bending” is the ability to manipulate one of the four elements of as water, fire, air, and earth; and the Avatar is the one who can manipulate all four elements.
And while the well known director can help to manipulate the script, the characters, and the elements that dart and flash on the screen, his ability to stray away from controversy is not as refined.
Several advocacy groups began to protest and call for a boycott of the film after the cast was revealed to be far more Caucasian than the animated series and far less Asian.
Yet Night cuts the tension with laughter and a joke…
“The great news is I am Asian!”
And he slides back into a serious tone.
“Anime is an art form based on ambiguous facial features—it is part of the art form. You got a problem with that, talk to the [guys] who invented anime. That girl looks like my daughter, that boy looks like Noah [the central character], there is no Inuit that looks like Katara” exclaims Shyamalan. “This wasn’t an agenda for me.”
Despite the criticism, the film has a fairly diverse cast, a process that Shyamalan enjoyed assembling.
“The casting of the movie was a really wonderful opportunity to make a world of nationalities that I was excited about.”
“Diverse, diverse, its one of the great assets and the subject matter that it was borrowing from all cultures, Indian, Thai, Japanese, every single culture was borrowed from in the background in the show.”
Slumdog star Dev Patel, was little known at the time of Shyamalan’s casting calls, yet Patel stood out as a finalist.
“There was this kid in London who tried out, and I was like this kid, he killed this audition but I was like there is no way I can cast this guy. And [then] I was like, could I?”
“And then Slumdog [Millionaire]” came out and I was like man, and I called up Paramount and I was like is this crazy… but this kid should play this prince that is completely too sweet and too soft for his dad who thinks he should be ruthless.”
“We had him come in.. and I was like this is the guy.”
As for the rising criticism over the years regarding his films and filmmaking ability, Shyamalan applauds it.
“It’s a compliment when everybody is up my a**…They are trying dissect you to show you why you re not that great, which is wonderful thing for them to try to do.
“My job is to just keep making movies and [the criticism will] go away or I will prove them right or wrong. Time will tell…and I am fine with that.”
“In the end your critics are you hard teachers and its good to be tough on yourself.”
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