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M. Night Shyamalan: «If the Apocalypse depends on our choices»

From The sixth sense then the director M. Night Shyamalan it has frightened, disturbed, surprised, questioned us about death, hope and the horrors of the world or that reside within us. With Knocking at the door (in theaters from February 2) continues in the same vein: he offers us a film on the apocalypse that speaks of today, of the border between faith and reality (“Does it really exist?” asks the director who landed in Rome to promote the film), on human choices increasingly connected to each other and on the fear of the stranger knocking on the door.

Those who Knocking at the door of the house of Andrew (Jonathan Groff), Eric (Ben Aldridge) and his adopted daughter Wen are four thugs armed (including Dave Bautista) that put them in front of a choice: the world will end unless a family member is sacrificed. Is this a joke? Over time the three realize that those words are not so crazy. What would you do if you had to choose to save your family or humanity? This is the disturbing question of the film.

The four characters are nothing more than a reference to Horsemen of the Apocalypse of the Bible. “I’ve always been fascinated by religious mythologies,” he says Shyamalan, «here I use the Knights as if they were real figures manifesting themselves in the modern world. On the other hand, religions are inevitably reflected in civilization and confront us with the most classic of questions: what do we believe in?». Another question from Knocking at the doorwhich is inspired by the best-seller The house at the end of the world by Paul Tremblay. Shyamalan however opts for a different ending. You will find out which one.

Morgan “Mo” Smith

After all, the director of Signs seems to mean: The Apocalypse depends on we and our choices. «I believe that the Apocalypse and the wrong choices of men are not separate things», says Shyamalan, «in this film one has to believe in the other, in the stranger who knocks on the door. The pandemic has taught us the wrong lesson: it has isolated us and made everyone think of their own family. Instead we were all fragile in the same way, biologically and emotionally ».

Source: Vanity Fair

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