Unbreakable (2000) Review

"No shooting friends, Joseph."
-Audrey Dunn


Security guard, David Dunn (Bruce Willis), is the sole survivor of a horrible train wreck and comes away completely unscathed.  He is approached by comic book theorist, Elijah Price (Samuel L. Jackson), who believes David may in fact be a real-life superhero.  As David comes to terms with what happened and tries to repair his relationships with his family, the truth becomes more and more clear and he decides to find out what he is capable of.


What Works:

Unbreakable is a film that has aged really well.  It was way ahead of its time coming out in 2000 and in this post Marvel Cinematic Universe world, the deconstruction of the superhero genre works really well.  It's a hyper-realistic superhero story and those aspects work very well.

The family drama aspects are really fascinating and a lesser movie would have just skimmed over this stuff.  When the movie begins, David and his wife, Audrey (Robin Wright), are about to separate, but the crash gives them an opportunity to try again.  David's son, Joseph (Spencer Treat Clark), immediately buys into Elijah's idea that David has abilities and becomes obsessed.  I really like the scenes with David trying to fix his family and I'm glad theses aspects aren't just brushed away.

Samuel L. Jackson is fantastic, as per usual, but I really like how he is the exact opposite of Bruce Willis' character.  They have a great dynamic and Jackson shines in every scene he is in.

Finally, I really enjoyed the reveal at the end of the film.  I knew going in that Elijah was somehow a villain, but I really didn't know to what extent.  The reveal that he caused all of these horrible accidents to find someone like David was insane and really well handled.  It caught me totally of guard, but it makes a lot of sense in hindsight.  This character, at the end of the day, just wanted to be a super villain.  That's crazy.  And this film ends with him simply being put into a institution.  That seems like what would really happen if someone claiming to be a super villain came about.  This does make me worried about seeing Glass because Unbreakable has such a fitting end to this character.


What Sucks:

I do wish we had gotten to see the actual train crash.  I was hoping we would get a Final Destination-esque sequence with people dying all around David with him being totally fine.  It could have been really awesome and better than just cutting to news footage of the wreck.

The second act of Unbreakable slows down a bit too much.  I think one more scene of David doing something and not getting hurt would have been great to keep the energy of the story going.  It just lags a bit too much in the middle.


Verdict:

Unbreakable is a solid film and one of M. Night Shyamalan's stronger efforts.  The family dynamic is really interesting, Jackson is awesome, and I really appreciate the movie's realistic approach to the subject matter.  The second act needed more energy and it would have been nice to see the train crash, but Unbreakable is still a movie that was ahead if its time, has aged very well, and has certainly got it going on. 

 8/10: Really Good 

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