The Watchers: Which tough 2000s film inspired Ishana Shyamalan’s thriller?

What is it about? Lost in the forest, Mina finds shelter in a house where three people already live. Then he discovers the rules of this very secret place: every night, the residents must allow themselves to be watched by the mysterious inhabitants of this forest. They cannot see them, but they watch everything.

Daughter…

Les Totators is the first film of Ishana Shyamalan, daughter of the maestro du suspense Mr. Night Shyamalan. An early career that the director of The Sixth Sense famously named after he created it entirely. Since then, this is not their first artistic collaboration Ishana Shyamalan Wrote and produced several episodes of the Servant TV series created by his father in 2019:

“I’ve been working with my father for several years. We’ve achieved a very good balance. It’s sometimes difficult, but also wonderful, because we’re both artists and we love ourselves very much.”as he confides.

Literary genesis

Originally, The Watchman is a book of the same name by author Am Shine, published in 2021 by HEAD OF ZEUS editions. A story that the director had read and that he wanted to adapt from page 70. Ishana Shyamalan wanted to stay true to the world of the novel, the horror thriller, his kind of penchant.

This is one of the most anticipated thrillers of 2024: Watchmen is a must-see at the cinema… by Mr. Night Shyamalan’s daughter.

“Summer of Shyamalan”

Les Tiesteurs was released two months before Mr. Night Shyamalan’s new film, The Trap (August 9, 2024), about a serial killer who stalks the audience of a successful singer. Family rivalry is far from destabilizing them, as the director suggested:

“Releasing our two films almost at the same time is really a coincidence. We wanted the best release dates for these two films. It turns out that both were ready for summer, so Warner suggested that we release them back to back. Hence the marketing approach: ‘Summer of Shyamalan.’

Eclectic inspirations

If the feature film is an undeniable tribute to Irish folklore, the director also revealed that he took a lot of inspiration from Lars von Trier’s disturbing Antichrist. “Its fatal and twilight atmosphere” as well as “His true closeness to nature”.

Antichrist was presented at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, and its heroine Charlotte Gainsbourg won the prize for a female interpretation, the film caused controversy with its many explicit (and not simulated) sex scenes and its extreme violence (mutilation, etc.).

Fed up with the terrifying world of his father Mr. Night Shyamalan since childhood, the young filmmaker was also immersed in Pan de Guillermo del Toro’s Labyrinth, as well as Robert Eggers’ The Witcher, even if he admits to being his ultimate inspiration. It remains the fantastic cinema of Hayao Miyazaki.

In terms of visual choices, Waters borrows certain elements of Wong Kar-wai’s Fallen Angels and Krzysztof Kieslowski’s aesthetic for his color work.

“My Purpose Is to Make You Uncomfortable”: Will Mr. Night Shyamalan’s Daughter Be Stronger Than Her Father?

filming locations

In a nod to the original novel, Ishana Shyamalan turned the bar scene into the pub where Shayne wrote her book in Galway, Ireland. On the other hand, the surrounding forests did not live up to their expectations, until the team fell in the forest of Ballinastoe in the Wicklow region, which was a real tie for them:

“It’s a picturesque place, where dark and majestic trees abound. Sometimes it’s enough to touch someone to disintegrate. It’s a place frozen in time. We realized very early on that the forest would be a character in itself.”– says the young film director.

Some of the scenes were very trying to turn around as the team had to face extreme conditions where at times they had to run for hours in the humid and icy forest.