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Signs is a 2002 science fiction thriller film written, produced, and directed by M. Night Shyamalan and starring Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix, Rory Culkin, and Abigail Breslin. Although the plot revolves around aliens and crop circles, producer Frank Marshall said, "It's really about human emotions set in motion by a supernatural event." The film received generally positive critical reception and was one of the highest grossing films of 2002.
[edit] Plot
The Hess family lives on a farm in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Graham Hess (Mel Gibson) is a former Episcopal priest whose wife, Colleen, died in a horrific traffic accident caused by a veterinarian named Ray Reddy (played by M. Night Shyamalan). He cares for his children Morgan (Rory Culkin), who suffers from asthma, and Bo (Abigail Breslin) with the help of his younger brother Merrill (Joaquin Phoenix), a former minor league baseball player. Things are uneventful in Graham's life until a mysterious crop circle appears in his cornfield. Its origin and purpose is unknown; some townspeople speculate that it may be a prank while a few others think that it may have been created by intelligent alien life-forms. Meanwhile, reports of violent animal behavior has spread across town. This hits home when Morgan has to kill one of his own dogs when it attacks his sister. A series of strange events take place over the next several days. Graham hears the sound of footsteps on his roof, but cannot locate the source. The next night, he hears the sound again and he and Merrill chase a tall, dark figure from the roof of the barn into the cornfield where it disappears without explanation. The next day in town, Merrill runs into an old friend at an army recruitment office where it's revealed by a local prankster, Lionel Pricherson, that he never reached the major leagues because, although he held the minor league home run record, he also held the strikeout record; he felt compelled to swing at every pitch. Bo and Morgan find an old baby monitor and purchase batteries for it. They also find a book explaining what might happen during an alien invasion including an artist's depiction of a destroyed farmhouse, looking eerily similar to the Hess' home, complete with three burning bodies. On their return home, strange noises come from the baby monitor. Morgan, believing the sound is an alien signal, climbs on to the car roof to get a better signal, but the noises fade away. Later, while investigating his German Shepherd's barking, Graham hears the unusual clicking noises coming from the cornfield and glimpses what appears to be a long green leg disappearing into the corn. Startled, he sprints back to the house before looking back. He then tells Bo, Morgan and Merrill that they can watch the television coverage of the crop circles, something he had steadfastly objected to earlier. They turn on the news to discover that large, mysterious and unidentifiable lights have been spotted over Mexico City. That night, Graham has a conversation with Merrill about his own faith. It's revealed that Graham lost his faith in God following his wife's death. He challenges Merrill's belief that they will not be harmed by the mysterious events as reliance on coincidence, signs, and miracles as evidence of some higher power. He tells him the story of his wife's dying words: "Tell Merrill to swing away." Graham believes that the words were meaningless, the result of a random memory as her brain died. He says there is no one watching out for them. The following morning, Graham travels into town to visit Ray Reddy, after getting a mysterious phone call from him. After he has left, Merrill sees startling video footage on the news of an alien that was spotted during a boy's birthday party in Brazil. Graham finds Ray staring blankly out his car window and bleeding. Ray apologizes for the accident that occurred, tells Graham that "they don't like water" and that a lot of people have gone to the lake. Before driving away and leaving Graham in the driveway, Ray tells him that he trapped "one" in the pantry. Graham investigates, taking a carving knife from the kitchen and attempting to use it like a mirror to catch the intruder's reflection from under the pantry door. When he does so, fingers that are not human try to claw at his hand from the other side. Startled, Graham reacts by slicing off the fingers and quickly departs. Graham returns home and proposes to his family two options: go to the lake in hope that the aliens do not like water, or stay home. After a family vote (in which Graham says that his vote counts for two) the family decides to stay home and they board up all the doors and windows. While Graham and Merrill do this, Morgan and Bo watch the news and find out that the mysterious airborne lights are now visible over approximately 274 cities worldwide, appearing within a mile of crop signs, and the appearances are growing rapidly. The family decides to have their last full family meal, choosing their favorite foods. In an emotional scene, Graham lashes out at his children for wanting to pray before eating. Morgan reveals that he resents his father since his mother's death and holds him responsible. Graham breaks down, and then holds his children and brother while they all cry, realizing how much the death of Colleen has affected them and how scared they all are. Suddenly, the baby monitor begins broadcasting the mysterious noises. Graham checks the television only to see a test pattern. They then board up the last doors and windows and go to the living room. Their dog, who was accidentally left outside, begins to bark alarmingly, but is quickly silenced with a yelp. Soon after, something can be heard climbing onto the roof and getting into the attic. When Merrill realizes that no one boarded up the attic access door in the ceiling, the family decides to hide in the basement. Graham and Merrill manage to prevent the aliens from entering the basement door, however, one of them finds a way in through a coal shaft and grabs Morgan's neck. Although the alien is repelled, Morgan suffers an asthma attack from the shock and Graham realizes that he has left Morgan's inhaler upstairs. The next morning, they hear on the radio that, in less than 6 hours, the aliens have been routed, a method of fighting the invaders has been developed and they are now retreating, even leaving behind their wounded. Graham decides to venture out for medicine to treat Morgan's asthma. Seeing that there is no signal coming in from the walkie-talkie, Graham and the family head upstairs. Suddenly and unexpectedly, they come face to face with an alien for the first time and it grabs Morgan before anyone can react. As the alien holds Morgan hostage, Graham notices that two of the alien's fingers are missing, implying that this is the alien who was in Ray's pantry, and thay it has stayed behind for revenge. After this realization, the remainder of Graham's flashback to Colleen's death is revealed: she is still coherent as she dies and tells Graham that she loves him, to look after their children, tells him to "see" and to "tell Merrill to swing away". Back in the present, Graham sees Merrill's trophy baseball bat on the wall and tells Merrill to "swing away." Merrill grabs his bat and attacks the alien. As Merrill moves in, the alien sprays a poisonous gas into Morgan's face and releases him. During the ensuing fight, the alien is injured when a glass of water spills onto its shoulder. Merrill realizes that water is deadly to the alien (this is why none of them came near water) and uses the unfinished glasses of water Bo has left all over the house (Bo is very specific about her drinking water, and rarely finishes a whole glass) to defeat the alien while Graham takes Morgan outside and administers his asthma medication. Although Merrill and Bo believe Morgan to be dead, Graham is convinced that the asthma attack prevented the poison gas from entering his lungs. Morgan soon recovers. Realizing that Colleen's dying words meant something after all, and seeing that a number of coincidences saved his family's life, Graham's faith is restored. The final montage shows winter weather outside as Graham is back in his clerical garb preparing for church. [edit] CastAs is usual in his films, Shyamalan is seen in a brief cameo.
[edit] TracksMusic Composed by James Newton Howard.
[edit] Release[edit] ReceptionSigns garnered mostly positive reviews from movie critics.[2] Roger Ebert wrote: "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 ... 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.[3]" Like all of Shyamalan's work, Signs is not without its detractors, with Variety's Todd McCarthy writing "After the overwrought Unbreakable and now the meager Signs, it's fair to speculate whether Shyamalan's persistence in replicating the otherworldly formula of The Sixth Sense might not be a futile and self-defeating exercise."[4] It grossed nearly $228 million domestically and $408 million worldwide[5] at the box office, ranking only behind The Sixth Sense in Shyamalan's box office success and grossing more than The Village and Unbreakable combined. In 2004, it was listed as #77 on Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Moments for the Brazilian birthday party scene. [edit] Home videoOn the DVD, there are some deleted scenes:
[edit] References[edit] External links
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