One could argue that the career of M. Night Shyamalan had been on the downswing after his 2002 film, “Signs.” After that, the filmmaker released a string of films (“The Village,” “The Lady in the Water,” “The Happening,” “The Last Airbender,” and “After Earth”) which all were seen as critical disappointments. But then something happened — Shyamalan discovered the micro-budget formula. This led to films such as “Split” and “The Visit,” both turning into box office hits and earning pretty good reviews. And in the future, that’s the formula that the filmmaker would like to keep working with.
Speaking to Collider, Shyamalan talked about the two untitled thrillers that he’s writing and directing, which will be released through Universal. While he’s still mum on the details (as per usual with his projects), the director did hint that there might actually be three total films in the works.
“I just had two movie ideas I felt very strongly about…” said Shyamalan. “And, interesting enough, there might be a third thing that came to me that might end up going in between these two. So there might be three.”
And while your first instincts might be to think that Shyamalan is crafting another trilogy, like the recently-ended Eastrail 177 Trilogy (“Unbreakable,” “Split,” and “Glass”), the director promises that they’re each different but will follow a similar production model that has been working well, as of late. Namely, small budget, big ideas, huge profit.
“I’m loving this approach from ‘The Visit’ on where they’re minimal, contained, I own them, we take big tonal risks and try to hit that note of absurd-but-grounded, that dark humor moment and deal with some complicated things and not necessarily take the audience where they’re comfortable, both during or even at the end,” he said.
He continued, “That’s all mitigated because we’re working with a respectable number and I feel like I’m being a good partner to my distributors. I like that because it allows me to iterate really fast in the making of these stories, so those films follow that architecture of approach and process. Even if it’s tricking myself into being more dangerous, it’s working because when I think about these three films that I’m thinking about—all weird and dark—I think that they speak to each other a little bit.”
The first of these films is expected to be released sometime in 2021.