{"id":2150,"date":"2006-07-21T22:13:00","date_gmt":"2006-07-21T22:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2006\/07\/its-a-cookbook-its-a-cookbook\/"},"modified":"2006-07-21T22:13:00","modified_gmt":"2006-07-21T22:13:00","slug":"its-a-cookbook-its-a-cookbook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2006\/07\/its-a-cookbook-its-a-cookbook.html","title":{"rendered":"“It’s a cookbook! It’s a cookbook!”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a>
Eventually I may have something more substantial to say about Lady in the Water<\/i>. But in the meantime, a bizarro connection occurs to me. And warning, there be a semi-spoiler ahead. (But I\u2019m revealing something from the middle of the film, not the end.)<\/span><\/p>\n

You know how M. Night Shyamalan<\/a> has been called a Rod Serling wanna-be? Especially ever since The Village<\/i> (2004) came out, and a number of people took it to be a rip-off of the Twilight Zone<\/i> episode \u2018A Hundred Yards over the Rim<\/a>\u2018 (1961)?<\/p>\n

In Lady in the Water<\/i>, Shyamalan himself plays a man who, we are told, is destined to write a book that will inspire a future \u201cgreat leader\u201d \u2014 and the practically messianic significance of this prompted me to tell my wife that Shyamalan had basically cast himself as the muse to the Antichrist. I\u2019m joking, of course, but the \u201cgreat leader\u201d prophesied in this film does sound rather similar to the archvillain that one finds in end-times novels<\/a>; he also reminds me of the righteous dictator who takes over the American government, and then the world, in William Randolph Hearst\u2019s propaganda flick<\/a> Gabriel over the White House<\/a><\/i> (1933).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Anyway. That tangent aside, the book that Night\u2019s character is writing \u2014 the book that will inspire this future presidential saviour, the book that was in turn inspired by the Narfs and their allies in the Blue World, etc. \u2014 is called The Cookbook<\/i>. And it dawned on me today that this may be some weird sort of homage to another Twilight Zone<\/i> episode, \u2018To Serve Man<\/a>\u2018 (1962). Wikipedia\u2019s synopsis:<\/p>\n

A race of aliens known as the Kanamits land on Earth and promise to be nothing but helpful to the cause of humanity, as dictated in a seemingly innocuous book called \u201cTo Serve Man.\u201d They eradicate hunger, eliminate war, and eliminate the need for expensive power sources. Soon humans are volunteering for trips to the Kanamits\u2019 home planet. All is not well, however, when a decoder discovers the Kanamits\u2019 true intentions. Their book, \u201cTo Serve Man\u201d, is a cookbook.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So \u2026 is Shyamalan hinting in some strange and twisted way that the Narfs are actually the bad guys, ready to destroy humanity with the aid of a book that was seemingly oh so helpful to us? It is tempting to think so, but naaaah, he isn\u2019t that<\/i> clever.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eventually I may have something more substantial to say about Lady in the Water. But in the meantime, a bizarro connection occurs to me. And warning, there be a semi-spoiler ahead. (But I\u2019m revealing something from the middle of the film, not the end.) You know how M. Night Shyamalan has been called a Rod […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1116,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n"It's a cookbook! It's a cookbook!"<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Eventually I may have something more substantial to say about Lady in the Water. But in the meantime, a bizarro connection occurs to me. 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