GlassEveryone wants to believe that they are special; and the irony is that people are as special as they believe that they are. Glass is a psychological superhero movie and follow up to writer/director M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable and Split, featuring characters from both films. Almost twenty years after David Dunn (Bruce Willis) was convinced that he was secretly a superhero by scheming mastermind and comic book enthusiast, Elijah Price, a.k.a. "Mr. Glass" (Samuel L. Jackson), he and his grown son, Joseph (Spencer Treat Clark), secretly coordinate David's clandestine vigilante operations from their family business. After David crosses paths with Kevin Wendell Crumb (James MacAvoy)--whose dissociative identity disorder culminates in a nigh-superhuman personality dubbed "The Beast"--both are apprehended and brought to Raven Hill Memorial Mental Institute. Here, a psychologist named Dr. Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson) tries to convince them--and long-term resident, Elijah--that their superhuman abilities are little more than delusions of grandeur.
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M. Night Shyamalan is well-known for putting "twists" into his films like a kind of signature. Split closes with a cameo by Bruce Willis (as David Dunn) that ties the film back to Shyamalan's earlier Unbreakable, forming the basis for the "shared universe" between these movies and Glass. In the long span of time since David came to terms with his existential doubts, he has become closer with his son, especially after the passing of his wife, Audrey, five years prior. The dark green rain poncho he wore during his days working security at the stadium has become like a costume, with the added benefit of concealing his face from the various cameras that threaten to unmask him as "The Overseer", a nickname branded by online enthusiasts of his exploits. Much of Glass is similar to a gritty superhero tale at first. David is reintroduced after stalking--and then delivering justice to--a pair of obnoxious punks who have been assaulting pedestrians and recording the incident for online views. But David has really been tracking "The Beast" since the events in Split, despite protests by Joseph that he's risking too much exposure on his "walks", eventually identifying him in the factory district. After David and Kevin are apprehended and imprisoned in specialized cells at Raven Hill, much of the rest of Glass resembles One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, with Dr. Staple as a surrogate for Nurse Ratched. Dr. Staple seems genuinely convinced that the reason for her three patients' fixations on superheroism comes from a "disorder" tied to the frontal lobes of their brains. She submits David to an MRI, and uses his x-ray like evidence to support that his behavior is a result of some form of brain damage following the train crash so long ago--the one orchestrated by Elijah where he was the only survivor. Elijah's stay at Raven Hill has been somewhat different; because of his significant intellect, he is given serious sedatives meant to keep him in a near vegetative state. His mother (Charlayne Woodard) frequently visits him, and discusses her son's strong fascination with comic books as a record of human achievement with Dr. Staple. After the events of Split, Kevin's erstwhile captive, Casey Cooke (Anya Taylor-Joy) has found peace in her new foster home, but feels sorrow for Kevin in spite of her captivity at the hands of "some" of Kevin's collective personalities, referred to as "The Horde". When she is informed of Kevin's capture, she solicits Dr. Staple to see Kevin, which reveals that her sympathy for Kevin and fearlessness in engaging him physically--not to mention their commiseration over their respective painful pasts--might just be the key in diffusing "The Beast" and his indomitable rampage.
It's noteworthy that Glass has released in a time when superhero movies have become an unstoppable box office force, with stories that follow familiar beats--heroes may be pressed beyond their limits, but emerge triumphant against the forces of evil in the end. Glass takes the idea of what makes a superhero and goes beyond (and subverts) tropes of the superhero genre. The film starts as though it were cliches of the genre, from comic book monikers like "The Overseer", to the promise of a final confrontation between the hero and villain in a spectacular set piece. Glass plays with audience expectations as if it were riding a see-saw, like how it handles whether the main characters are delusional or actually possess special abilities. Despite the raw brutality of "The Beast" and the diabolical cunning of the eponymous "Mr. Glass", it is Dr. Staple who becomes an antagonist to these three unusual men. She claims that she has "three days" to convince them that their perceptions of themselves as powerful beings is nothing but a fantasy. To that end, she capitalizes on each of their "weaknesses" to keep them in check, from David's kryptonite in the form of powerful hoses blasting him with gallons of water, to Kevin's sensitivity to flashing lights, which triggers a change in personality. Dr. Staple tells a seemingly incoherent Elijah that she regrets how he has been treated heretofore, sedated into oblivion. Yet instead of changing his medication regimen, she adds over a hundred cameras throughout the hospital, as if taunting him to expose himself. Given that Glass draws its name from Elijah's self-prescribed alter ego--one with villainous connotations--it is unsurprising that his motives are the fulcrum upon which the film's action pivots. He is wholly convinced that people like David and Kevin are scions for what lies hidden within humanity, and considers himself justified in doing anything to convince the world that he is "not a mistake", and more importantly, that he is right. Despite his methods, he comes across more like a tragic anti-hero than a villain in Glass, desperately looking for acceptance in a world where he has felt different and unappreciated for what he desires to add to the tapestry of society.
Recommended for: Fans of a psychological thriller that explores and reinterprets tropes of the superhero genre, adding real-world context that blurs the lines between fantasy and reality. Glass is best suited for audiences that have at least watched Unbreakable; those who have seen Split will also notice how these films and their themes relate to one another.
It's noteworthy that Glass has released in a time when superhero movies have become an unstoppable box office force, with stories that follow familiar beats--heroes may be pressed beyond their limits, but emerge triumphant against the forces of evil in the end. Glass takes the idea of what makes a superhero and goes beyond (and subverts) tropes of the superhero genre. The film starts as though it were cliches of the genre, from comic book monikers like "The Overseer", to the promise of a final confrontation between the hero and villain in a spectacular set piece. Glass plays with audience expectations as if it were riding a see-saw, like how it handles whether the main characters are delusional or actually possess special abilities. Despite the raw brutality of "The Beast" and the diabolical cunning of the eponymous "Mr. Glass", it is Dr. Staple who becomes an antagonist to these three unusual men. She claims that she has "three days" to convince them that their perceptions of themselves as powerful beings is nothing but a fantasy. To that end, she capitalizes on each of their "weaknesses" to keep them in check, from David's kryptonite in the form of powerful hoses blasting him with gallons of water, to Kevin's sensitivity to flashing lights, which triggers a change in personality. Dr. Staple tells a seemingly incoherent Elijah that she regrets how he has been treated heretofore, sedated into oblivion. Yet instead of changing his medication regimen, she adds over a hundred cameras throughout the hospital, as if taunting him to expose himself. Given that Glass draws its name from Elijah's self-prescribed alter ego--one with villainous connotations--it is unsurprising that his motives are the fulcrum upon which the film's action pivots. He is wholly convinced that people like David and Kevin are scions for what lies hidden within humanity, and considers himself justified in doing anything to convince the world that he is "not a mistake", and more importantly, that he is right. Despite his methods, he comes across more like a tragic anti-hero than a villain in Glass, desperately looking for acceptance in a world where he has felt different and unappreciated for what he desires to add to the tapestry of society.
Recommended for: Fans of a psychological thriller that explores and reinterprets tropes of the superhero genre, adding real-world context that blurs the lines between fantasy and reality. Glass is best suited for audiences that have at least watched Unbreakable; those who have seen Split will also notice how these films and their themes relate to one another.