M. Night Shyamalan: Micro Budget Filmmaker?

Ok, this is a crazy premise, but I’d like to pitch the idea that M. Night Shyamalan is really the most successful micro budget filmmaker making movies today. You say, come on Scott, have you been dropped on your head? I say thee nay. I know Night works with big budgets, but if you look at the elements in his movies they could be made on a micro budget. If you take away the big name cast and do some minor trimming on the scale of production, they are very producible. If you study Night’s style, you’ll find it is very simple, with very basic coverage and little or no "showy" shots. Hell, in "Unbreakable" most scenes play in one shot.

Let's look at the logistics for each film:

"The Sixth Sense", a guy spends most of the movie talking to a little kid. Locations are houses, schools, an office, a store, basic locations, etc...to name a few. The cast is small, primarily consisting of a doctor, a kid, the kid’s mom, the doc's wife and a few supporting cast. The special effects are a few nasty wounds and puking green pee soup.

"Unbreakable". Come on, this film's second scene is a massive train wreck that we don't get to see! That’s a great cheat. Locations are just a little tougher here, with the train station, football stadium and wrecked train, but with some clever work you could imply the scope. Again you have a small cast with our hero, a villain, a son, a wife and some minor supporting characters. The special effects are small scale with a stunt fall down stairs, wrecked car, and wrecked train on TV that was low resolution cgi work. The final fight scene is a wrestling match, not a fight with massive destruction.

"Signs". Here again we have an alien invasion that happens mostly off screen and some shakey home video footage. What a savings there. Here’s a breakdown of the major locations: farm house, small town, a store, a recruiter’s office. Again, a small, tight cast with an ex-minister, his brother, son, daughter and some supporting folks. The special effects for “Signs” are the trickiest of Night’s films with the full body alien suit (I know it was mainly CGI in the movie, but there’s no way any indie could afford that kind of CGI work, so that’s the reason I’m saying an alien suit), but hey, you only need one.

In all of Night’s movies, I'd say the hardest element to find kids who can act. As they say, avoid working with kids and animals, but if you dig deep enough you can find kids who can pull it off. I’ve worked with some great kid actors.

What I love about Night's movies is that he is basically making dramas and then dropping a high concept on them. Here's a breakdown of the high concept vs. the low concept:

"The Sixth Sense": A kid sees dead people. No, that's not the real story. It's about grief and accepting death.

"Unbreakable": A guy finds out he's a superhero. Nope. It's about realizing that suppressing your abilities to please somebody else will ultimately destroy that relationship and upon re-finding your strength, you become whole again.

"Signs": A family reacts to an alien invasion. That’s not what the film is about at all. It’s really about a man rediscovering his faith.

I know some people who have felt cheated by "Unbreakable" and "Signs", but I think they're missing the real plots. These films show you the inner workings of the characters that are working through emotional problems and happen to be living through extra-ordinary events.

So, take a look at M. Night Shyamalan’s movies again and you’ll see my point. I’d bet that with some tweaks, you could make one of his movies for under $10,000 on DV. Now, I’m not advocating re-making his movies, there are way too many re-makes going on from Hollywood. What I’m urging is that micro budget, indie filmmakers use the same story telling techniques. Be creative. Make your characters living breathing people with inner problems to overcome. Think of the drama first, not the special effects which you really can't do well on a low budget anyway.

Scott is a Director of Photography with 15 years experience. He's shot 14 features, numerous shorts, commercials and music videos. He won an Emmy for a short he shot which aired nationally on PBS. Scott has also written several scripts, two of which have been produced and the films distributed around the world. You can learn more about Scott at www.scottspears.net