Lady in the Water
Encyclopedia
The soundtrack was composed by James Newton Howard
. The last four tracks are non-soundtrack songs from singer/songwriter Amanda Ghost
, Indie rock
band A Whisper in the Noise
, and rock 'n' roll revivalists Silvertide
. Each of the four songs was written by Bob Dylan
. Howard won the IFMCA Award for Best Film Score for Lady in the Water in 2006, as well as the awards for Best Original Score for a Fantasy/Science Fiction/Horror Film, and Best Single Cue of 2006 for "The Great Eatlon"
. At Metacritic
, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film scored a 36, based on 36 reviews. Of Shyamalan's role in the film, Mark Kermode
said, "It's like someone pouring petrol over their heads and setting fire to themselves."
Variety
magazine wrote a scathing advance review that appeared on July 16, 2006. Common complaints about the film were that little effort was put into getting the viewer to believe in the world, that few moments of the film could be taken seriously, and that Shyamalan was using the film as a form of self-indulgence; instead of having a minor cameo
, as in most of his films, Shyamalan cast himself as a visionary whose writing changes the world, and another character included a film critic — portrayed by actor Bob Balaban
as arrogant, self-assured, and passive — who is despised by the other characters and comes to a violent end. Many reviewers attacked this perceived self-indulgence: Manohla Dargis
of The New York Times
wrote of the story, "Apparently those who live in the water now roam the earth trying to make us listen, though initially it’s rather foggy as to what precisely we are supposed to hear —the crash of the waves, the songs of the sirens, the voice of God —until we realize that of course we're meant to cup our ear to an even higher power: Mr. Shyamalan."
Frank Lovece
of Film Journal International said, "Fans of actor Paul Giamatti or of filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan may get something out of Lady in the Water, a fractured fairy tale about a water nymph who comes to a Philadelphia apartment house to deliver an important message. Anyone else is likely to be perplexed by the muddled mythmaking or actively astonished at the self-indulgent ego of a writer-director-producer who casts himself in the role of a visionary writer whose martyrdom will change the world."
Michael Medved
gave Lady in the Water one and a half stars (out of four) calling it, "... a full-out, flamboyant cinematic disaster, a work of nearly unparalleled arrogance and vapidity," adding that, "... Lady in the Water is all wet...."
Also panned was the fact that the film was based on a bedtime story Shyamalan told to his children; Pete Vonder Haar of Film Threat
commented: "If Shyamalan is going to use his kids as a focus group for future projects, maybe he should start making movies for Nickelodeon
already and stop wasting our time." Shyamalan went on to direct a film adaptation
of Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender
television series, which also received overwhelmingly negative reviews.
CNN
's Tom Charity, among many others, has called Lady in the Water the worst film of 2006. It was listed by Variety as one of the ten "biggest (financial) losers" of 2006. Wesley Morris
of The Boston Globe
wrote that though the film is "built on too much ponderous self-regard ... [t]here is a good chunk of Lady in the Water that is simply too well made and affectingly acted to dismiss as a mere exercise in arrogance."
box office
results for that weekend. It was Shyamalan's lowest opening for any of his five major films. Due to negative reviews and poor word-of-mouth, its second week fell sharply to $7.1 million, pushing its total to only $32.2 million. Its third weekend was no better, falling another 62.1% to $2.7 million. As of 2011, its total was $42.285 million. In addition, the film only made $30.5 million in the foreign box office, pulling its tally to approximately $72.785 million internationally. The film had an estimated $75 million budget for production and a further $70 million in advertising costs.
, HD DVD
, and Blu-ray
from Warner Home Video
on December 19, 2006.
Children's book
Shyamalan, who credits the development of the movie to a bedtime story he told his children about what happens in their pool at night, wrote the 72-page children's book Lady in the Water: A Bedtime Story (Little, Brown, New York, ISBN 0-316-01734-5) to coincide with the movie. The book's illustrations were made by Crash McCreery. It was released on the same day as the film, on July 21, 2006.
The book describes the narf, scrunt, Tartutic, and Eatlon, in detail, their roles are identical to those in the film. The book includes details not present in the film and omits others: additional details include the description of the sensations experienced by a vessel upon its awakening and the suggestion that a narf's presence activates the lawn sprinklers. The roles of Madame Narf, Healer, Symbolist, Guild, and Guardian are only suggested and not stated openly.
The tone of the book resembles in some respects that of Chris Van Allsburg
's The Mysteries of Harris Burdick
, sharing with it an air of unnerving mystery and a similar pace.
The Man Who Heard Voices
The Man Who Heard Voices (Gotham Books, New York, ISBN 1-59240-213-5), by Sports Illustrated
writer Michael Bamberger, recounting the making of the film, was released July 20, 2006.
James Newton Howard
James Newton Howard is an American composer best known for his scores to motion pictures. He is one of the most popular and respected composers for cinema, and has scored over 100 films...
. The last four tracks are non-soundtrack songs from singer/songwriter Amanda Ghost
Amanda Ghost
Amanda Ghost is a singer and songwriter from Enfield, North London, England. After an initial period in which she performed as a solo artist, she formed a band which performed under her name, and of which she was the lead singer...
, Indie rock
Indie rock
Indie rock is a genre of alternative rock that originated in the United Kingdom and the United States in the 1980s. Indie rock is extremely diverse, with sub-genres that include lo-fi, post-rock, math rock, indie pop, dream pop, noise rock, space rock, sadcore, riot grrrl and emo, among others...
band A Whisper in the Noise
A Whisper in the Noise
A Whisper in the Noise is a musical project of rock composer West Thordson. Centered in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro, the group is known for their dark sound and unique instrumentation, as well as their effective live performances...
, and rock 'n' roll revivalists Silvertide
Silvertide
Silvertide was a rock band hailing from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.-History:Silvertide was formed in January 2001 in Northeast Philadelphia. At first, Silvertide was signed by J Records. They released their first EP American Excess in 2002...
. Each of the four songs was written by Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
. Howard won the IFMCA Award for Best Film Score for Lady in the Water in 2006, as well as the awards for Best Original Score for a Fantasy/Science Fiction/Horror Film, and Best Single Cue of 2006 for "The Great Eatlon"
- "Prologue"
- "The Party"
- "Charades"
- "Ripples In The Pool"
- "The Blue World"
- "Giving The Kii"
- "Walkie Talkie"
- "Cereal Boxes"
- "Officer Jimbo"
- "The Healing"
- "The Great Eatlon"
- "End Titles"
- "The Times They Are A-Changin'The Times They Are a-Changin'The Times They Are a-Changin opens with the title track, one of Dylan's most famous songs. Dylan's friend, Tony Glover, recalls visiting Dylan's apartment in September 1963, where he saw a number of song manuscripts and poems lying on a table. "The Times They Are a-Changin'" had yet to be recorded,...
" – A Whisper in the NoiseA Whisper in the NoiseA Whisper in the Noise is a musical project of rock composer West Thordson. Centered in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro, the group is known for their dark sound and unique instrumentation, as well as their effective live performances... - "Every Grain of SandEvery Grain of SandEvery Grain of Sand is a song written by Bob Dylan and originally released on his 1981 album Shot of Love. It was subsequently included on the compilation Biograph. An alternate take of this song was released in The Bootleg Series Volumes 1-3 1961-1991...
" - Amanda GhostAmanda GhostAmanda Ghost is a singer and songwriter from Enfield, North London, England. After an initial period in which she performed as a solo artist, she formed a band which performed under her name, and of which she was the lead singer... - "It Ain't Me BabeIt Ain't Me Babe"It Ain't Me Babe" is the title of a 1964 song by Bob Dylan, first included on his album Another Side of Bob Dylan. The song's opening line is allegedly influenced by musicologist/folk-singer John Jacob Niles' composition "Go 'Way From My Window." Niles is referred to by Dylan as an early...
" – SilvertideSilvertideSilvertide was a rock band hailing from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.-History:Silvertide was formed in January 2001 in Northeast Philadelphia. At first, Silvertide was signed by J Records. They released their first EP American Excess in 2002... - "Maggie's FarmMaggie's Farm"Maggie's Farm" is a song written by Bob Dylan, recorded on January 15, 1965, and released on the album Bringing It All Back Home on March 22 of that year...
" – Silvertide
Reception
Lady in the Water was critically panned around the time of its release and has an overall rating of 24% on the review conglomerate Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
. At Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film scored a 36, based on 36 reviews. Of Shyamalan's role in the film, Mark Kermode
Mark Kermode
Mark Kermode is an English film critic, musician and a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. He contributes to Sight and Sound magazine, The Observer newspaper and BBC Radio 5 Live, where he presents Kermode and Mayo's Film Reviews with Simon Mayo on Friday afternoons...
said, "It's like someone pouring petrol over their heads and setting fire to themselves."
Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
magazine wrote a scathing advance review that appeared on July 16, 2006. Common complaints about the film were that little effort was put into getting the viewer to believe in the world, that few moments of the film could be taken seriously, and that Shyamalan was using the film as a form of self-indulgence; instead of having a minor cameo
Cameo appearance
A cameo role or cameo appearance is a brief appearance of a known person in a work of the performing arts, such as plays, films, video games and television...
, as in most of his films, Shyamalan cast himself as a visionary whose writing changes the world, and another character included a film critic — portrayed by actor Bob Balaban
Bob Balaban
Robert Elmer "Bob" Balaban is an American actor, author and director.-Personal life:Balaban was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Eleanor and Elmer Balaban, who owned several movie theatres and later was a pioneer in cable television...
as arrogant, self-assured, and passive — who is despised by the other characters and comes to a violent end. Many reviewers attacked this perceived self-indulgence: Manohla Dargis
Manohla Dargis
Manohla Dargis is a chief film critic for The New York Times, along with A.O. Scott. She was formerly a chief film critic for the Los Angeles Times, the film editor at the LA Weekly, and a film critic at The Village Voice. She has written for a variety of publications, including Film Comment and...
of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
wrote of the story, "Apparently those who live in the water now roam the earth trying to make us listen, though initially it’s rather foggy as to what precisely we are supposed to hear —the crash of the waves, the songs of the sirens, the voice of God —until we realize that of course we're meant to cup our ear to an even higher power: Mr. Shyamalan."
Frank Lovece
Frank Lovece
Frank Lovece is an American journalist, author, comedy performer and comic book writer. He was additionally one of the first professional Web journalists, becoming an editor of a Silicon Alley start-up in 1996....
of Film Journal International said, "Fans of actor Paul Giamatti or of filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan may get something out of Lady in the Water, a fractured fairy tale about a water nymph who comes to a Philadelphia apartment house to deliver an important message. Anyone else is likely to be perplexed by the muddled mythmaking or actively astonished at the self-indulgent ego of a writer-director-producer who casts himself in the role of a visionary writer whose martyrdom will change the world."
Michael Medved
Michael Medved
Michael Medved is an American radio host, author, political commentator and film critic. His Seattle, Washington-based nationally syndicated talk show, The Michael Medved Show, airs throughout the U.S...
gave Lady in the Water one and a half stars (out of four) calling it, "... a full-out, flamboyant cinematic disaster, a work of nearly unparalleled arrogance and vapidity," adding that, "... Lady in the Water is all wet...."
Also panned was the fact that the film was based on a bedtime story Shyamalan told to his children; Pete Vonder Haar of Film Threat
Film Threat
Film Threat is a former print magazine and, now, webzine which focuses primarily on independent film, although it also reviews DVDs of mainstream films and Hollywood movies in theaters. It first appeared as a photocopied zine in 1985, created by Wayne State University students Chris Gore and André...
commented: "If Shyamalan is going to use his kids as a focus group for future projects, maybe he should start making movies for Nickelodeon
Nickelodeon (TV channel)
Nickelodeon, often simply called Nick and originally named Pinwheel, is an American children's channel owned by MTV Networks, a subsidiary of Viacom International. The channel is primarily aimed at children ages 7–17, with the exception of their weekday morning program block aimed at preschoolers...
already and stop wasting our time." Shyamalan went on to direct a film adaptation
The Last Airbender
The Last Airbender is a 2010 American fantasy adventure film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. It is a live-action film adaptation of the first season to the Nickelodeon animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender....
of Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender
Avatar: The Last Airbender
Avatar: The Last Airbender is an American animated television series that aired for three seasons on Nickelodeon from 2005 to 2008. The series was created and produced by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, who served as executive producers along with Aaron Ehasz...
television series, which also received overwhelmingly negative reviews.
CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
's Tom Charity, among many others, has called Lady in the Water the worst film of 2006. It was listed by Variety as one of the ten "biggest (financial) losers" of 2006. Wesley Morris
Wesley Morris
Wesley Morris is a film critic at The Boston Globe where he reviews films alongside Ty Burr. Morris and Burr also make regular appearances on NECN to discuss the latest films and do the weekly Take Two film review video series on Boston.com...
of The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...
wrote that though the film is "built on too much ponderous self-regard ... [t]here is a good chunk of Lady in the Water that is simply too well made and affectingly acted to dismiss as a mere exercise in arrogance."
Box office
In its opening weekend (21–23 July 2006), the film grossed a total of $18.2 million, placing third in the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
box office
Box office
A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to an event. Patrons may perform the transaction at a countertop, through an unblocked hole through a wall or window, or at a wicket....
results for that weekend. It was Shyamalan's lowest opening for any of his five major films. Due to negative reviews and poor word-of-mouth, its second week fell sharply to $7.1 million, pushing its total to only $32.2 million. Its third weekend was no better, falling another 62.1% to $2.7 million. As of 2011, its total was $42.285 million. In addition, the film only made $30.5 million in the foreign box office, pulling its tally to approximately $72.785 million internationally. The film had an estimated $75 million budget for production and a further $70 million in advertising costs.
Razzie Awards
| Nominee | Category | Result |
|---|---|---|
| M. Night Shyamalan M. Night Shyamalan Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan,known professionally as M. Night Shyamalan, is an Indian-born American screenwriter, film director, and producer known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots that climax with a twist ending. He is also known for filming his movies in and around... |
Worst Supporting Actor | rowspan=2 |
| Worst Director | ||
| Worst Screenplay | rowspan=4 | |
| Worst Picture | ||
| Sam Mercer Sam Mercer Sam Mercer is a producer of many Hollywood films, including several projects directed by M. Night Shyamalan such as Signs and The Sixth Sense, as well as other films like Van Helsing and Things We Lost in the Fire. His career started during the early 1980s as a location manager and later advanced... |
||
| Jose L. Rodriguez | ||
Home media
The film was released simultaneously on DVDDVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
, HD DVD
HD DVD
HD DVD is a discontinued high-density optical disc format for storing data and high-definition video.Supported principally by Toshiba, HD DVD was envisioned to be the successor to the standard DVD format...
, and Blu-ray
Blu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
from Warner Home Video
Warner Home Video
Warner Home Video is the home video unit of Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., itself part of Time Warner. It was founded in 1978 as WCI Home Video . The company launched in the United States with twenty films on VHS and Betamax videocassettes in late 1979...
on December 19, 2006.
Related books
Shyamalan, who credits the development of the movie to a bedtime story he told his children about what happens in their pool at night, wrote the 72-page children's book Lady in the Water: A Bedtime Story (Little, Brown, New York, ISBN 0-316-01734-5) to coincide with the movie. The book's illustrations were made by Crash McCreery. It was released on the same day as the film, on July 21, 2006.
The book describes the narf, scrunt, Tartutic, and Eatlon, in detail, their roles are identical to those in the film. The book includes details not present in the film and omits others: additional details include the description of the sensations experienced by a vessel upon its awakening and the suggestion that a narf's presence activates the lawn sprinklers. The roles of Madame Narf, Healer, Symbolist, Guild, and Guardian are only suggested and not stated openly.
The tone of the book resembles in some respects that of Chris Van Allsburg
Chris Van Allsburg
Chris Van Allsburg is an American author and illustrator of children's books. He twice won the Caldecott Medal, for Jumanji and The Polar Express , both of which he wrote and illustrated, and both of which were later adapted into successful motion pictures...
's The Mysteries of Harris Burdick
The Mysteries of Harris Burdick
The Mysteries of Harris Burdick is a 1984 picture book by the American author Chris Van Allsburg consisting of a series of unrelated, highly detailed images in the author's distinctive style...
, sharing with it an air of unnerving mystery and a similar pace.
The Man Who Heard Voices
The Man Who Heard Voices (Gotham Books, New York, ISBN 1-59240-213-5), by Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...
writer Michael Bamberger, recounting the making of the film, was released July 20, 2006.