Cream of the crop (From Western Telegraph)

Cream of the crop

I'm definitely a fan of M. Night Shyamalan. In 1999 he took the movie world by storm with a simple little ghost story called 'Sixth Sense'. But a classic, especially an early-career classic, is no guarantee of future classics from the same movie mind, but M. Night Shyamalan's output is proving to be quite respectable. 'Unbreakable' had flaws, but was a still a great film.

'Sixth Sense' was a ghost story with a huge twist, plain and simple. And telling ghost stories is something we would be doing round the campfire if film and TV had never been invented. Sensibly Shyamalan has stuck with our interest in the paranormal in 'Signs'.

Crop circles are the focus this time. We all know by now that these bizarre, often extremely elaborate, patterns of crushed crops in fields, usually making beautiful geometric shapes, are the work of thrill-seeking students on a night out (nerdy students too) rather than the 'X-File' explanations. One of the problems with the student theory arises where a crop circle/pattern is so elaborate that it must have taken hours to create, but where the farmer says it wasn't there an hour ago! Therefore the circles are explained as being the marks left by the landing gear of a flying saucer or as a message left by aliens, which we seem unable to understand. It is the latter explanation, which pops up in 'Signs'.

Mel Gibson plays Graham Hess, a pastor who turns his back on his faith after his wife dies. With his young son, and daughter, he is trying to get his life back on track.

One day huge crop circles appear all over the world at the same time. it seems the world is about to be invaded by aliens using these circles to organise the attack. One of the circles is in the cornfield right outside the Hess family's back door.

To quote the great 'Close Encounters Of The Third Kind' from Mr Spielberg, "They're here!" In fact, while I think too much is made of the Spielberg-Shyamalan comparison, you can't ignore the similar feel that this has to 'Close Encounters'. The way it differs most profoundly though is this: This is not really a film about crop circles. This is a film about a family grieving, and about a man struggling with his faith. It's also about the relationship between miracles and huge coincidence.

So, though the packet says one thing the director has made something else.

I know that when I see this film a second time, and I definitely will, I'll enjoy it ten times more. The most notable performances come from Phoenix, who is superb and Shyamalan himself, who appears as Ray Reddy. A busy day at the office for him.

If you're a sci-fi fan you'll enjoy the feel of most of 'Signs' and revel in the knowledge that these are still the early days of one of the masters of the genre. Is 'Signs' a future classic? I'm just not sure, but I do think that if I was 12 years old I'd be watching 'Signs' over and over in the way that I watched 'Close Encounters'. You should certainly go and see it, twice probably.

VAUGHAN SIVELL