Unbreakable - 2000

Director: M. Night Shyamalan

Cast: Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, Robin Wright Penn

Genre: Thriller, Supernatural, Comic Books

Rating: **** - "Really Liked it"

M. Night Shyamalan's follow up to the rounding success of the creepy but entertaining The Sixth Sense failed to excite audiences and was considered a disappointment compared to big box office numbers of The Sixth Sense. I'm not sure what audiences were thinking, but obviously many were expecting another Sixth Sense type of movie, which Unbreakable certainly was not. Personally, I enjoyed Unbreakable almost as much as I enjoyed The Sixth Sense, and would have liked it even more except for the way they ended the movie.

Unbreakable is the story of a husband in the middle of a broken marriage with a growing distance to his son. On the train back to Philadelphia from a job interview in NYC, there is an accident and Bruce Willis' character, David Dunn, emerges as the sole survivor - without a scratch on him - hence the title "Unbreakable". This amazing circumstance leads the strange and comic book obsessed Elijah Price, played by Samuel L. Jackson, to seek out Bruce Willis. Elijah Price is the polar opposite of David Dunn; whereas David Dunn is "unbreakable", Elijah Wood has a rare bone disease that makes his body incredibly fragile and subject to constant fractures. The two characters develop a growing, at times strained, relationship as Elijah Wood, using Comic Book analogies, attempts to convince David Dunn of his "unbreakableness" and suggests that perhaps Mr. Dunn should be doing something with his life that he hasn't. In the middle of all this is David Dunn's most broken family. He's been looking for work in NYC and plans to move away from his wife and son. He and his wife sleep in separate rooms and he has at best a distant relationship with his son. All that slowly changes - for the better - as David Dunn begins to question his role in life and the possibility that he may indeed be unbreakable.

Bruce Willis does a fine job as David Dunn and Samuel L. Jackson, as always, is excellent. But this is not a creepy, at times hair-tingling, ghost thriller like The Sixth Sense. The heart of the movie is about comic books and the heroes and villains that lie therein, and one man's obsession to finding a link in the real world to the imaginary world of his comics. It's also about a man finding his way in life and with his broken family and wondering if he is indeed something special, as Elijah Price believes. Where Sixth Sense fans were looking for something to spook them in their seats or some kind of shock ending, they instead found a well dialogued, lengthy movie about broken relationships and the search for something more in this life. This film is more about story then stunning scenes and that is probably why it turned off Sixth Sense fans. The movie also moves at a rather deliberate pace which makes it appear longer than it is, but I felt it was necessary to tell the story. Overall I enjoyed it and highly recommend it, just don't go in expecting another Sixth Sense or Signs.

What Parents Need to Know:
Common Sense Media rates this movie as:
15+ = For violence and sexual references:

This movie has a lot of violence. Although most of it is offscreen, its themes, including sexual assault, murder of the parents of two children, and genocide, may be especially disturbing. A child uses a gun. There is a brief vulgar reference and an implication of date rape.

Rotten Tomatoes rating: 67% (fresh)