We already know that M. Night Shyamalan was shooting a new film, “Trap,” in Pennsylvania, but then the actors strike started five or six weeks after production began. No word yet on whether production had been completed before the SAG strike began.
It turns out that Shyamalan wasn’t going to stop shooting this year. After “Trap,” his team had reserved offices in Cincinnati, Ohio for a project titled “Good Grades.” The shoot was set to take place from October 16th to December 8th.
No additional details were given, and I’m not sure if there have been any delays (yet) on this production date. The strike does look like it’ll keep on going past October.
This past February, Shyamalan released “Knock at the Cabin,” it was met with decent reviews. Shyamalan doesn’t really get great reviews anymore, at least he hasn’t gotten ultra positive ink since his ‘Sixth Sense’ and ‘Unbreakable’ days of yore.
Shyamalan does still have a fair amount of fans of his work. Hell, even the grouchy folks over at Cahiers du Cinéma love him — they raved about his last few, especially “Split,” “Old,” “Glass” and “The Visit.”
You can hate on the guy all you want, but at some point, Shyamalan was known as the director who gave us "The Sixth Sense" and "Unbreakable." As far as I'm concerned, those two films justify his existence in the cinematic realm, but he also peaked with those two releases.
"The Village" and "Signs" weren't half-bad either. Of course, following those, Shyamalan went on a deep dive of mediocrity; "Lady in the Water," and "The Happening," two unwatchable projects that signaled, at the time, the possible end of his reign as the heir of Hitchcock/Spielberg.
“Trap” has an August 2024 release date via Warner Bros.
For Schrader, AI solves the curious practical filmmaking problem he had. How about just creating Black people? No casting calls, no agents, no actors turning down the roles.