By JOCELYN NOVECK
AP National Writer
âCan you believe I found this online?â a delighted Prisca asks husband Guy at the beginning of âOld,â as their family arrives at a glistening beach resort.
Not to be a Debbie Downer quite so soon, but this isnât a good sign â for the family OR the film. âCan you believe I found this online?â has become the hackneyed catchphrase of the vacation horror movie. Every time a character says that, whether at a dreamy English estate or a stunning coastal retreat, you can set your watch â the first body will appear in minutes.
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Just as it takes a tough man to make a tender chicken, it takes a smart filmmaker to make a stupid movie, which I mean in the best possible way. Science-fiction films, once a cinematic counterpart to pulp fiction, are today often big-budget, overproduced spectacles that substitute grandiosity for imagination. M. Night Shyamalanâs new film, âOldâ (which opens in theatres on Friday), is different. His frequent artistic pitfall is complicationâthe burdening of stories with extravagant yet undeveloped byways in order to endow them with ostensible significance and to stoke exaggerated effects. With âOld,â facing the constraints of filming during the pandemicâon a project that heâd nonetheless planned before itâShyamalan has created a splendid throwback of a science-fiction thriller that develops a simple idea with stark vigor and conveys the straight-faced glee of realizing the straightforward logic of its enticin
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Review: Old shows director M Night Shyamalan at his best and worst go.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from go.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Watching Old might give you some gray hairs freep.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from freep.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.