Adapted from the A.M. Shine novel of the same name and directed by Ishana Night Shyamalan (M. Night’s daughter), the new horror movie/thriller, The Watchers, is an interesting film, until it isn’t. What starts out promising becomes a picture that is too convoluted, overly talky, and (eventually) quite absurd.

A solid Dakota Fanning is Mina, a young woman living in Ireland who still holds great emotional pain after her mother’s death 15 years earlier. Working a dead end job at a local pet store, Mina is tasked with watching over a parrot and delivering it to another town. Keeping it at home overnight, she prepares to go out to a bar; a scene that introduces a psychological arc that is never explored. Before leaving she jokingly gives the parrot a warning, “Try not to die.” The bird occasionally repeats the phrase back to her, taking it from cute silliness to a sinister warning.

After a long drive through some beautiful Irish countryside, Mina’s car breaks down on a lone path deep in the woods. Even though her navigation system was guiding her, any smart person would know to stick to the paved, public highways. As John Landis’ An American Werewolf in London taught us, “Stick to the roads.”

Mina gets turned around in the woods and becomes lost. Eventually, she finds herself trapped in a bunker called “the coop” with three strangers (Olwen Fouéré, Georgina Campbell, and Oliver Finnegan). The trio teach Mina of “The Watchers”, a hostile band of creatures who live deep in the forest. Each night, they come to the wall-sized two-way mirror to observe the humans. The now four inhabitants must line up for these unseen creatures to watch them acting “natural”. The mystery of why this occurs, what the creatures are, and the paths the film takes shall not be revealed in this review.

After building an interesting (if familiar) foundation, The Watchers begins to stumble over a screenplay littered with unexplored ideas. Shyamalan toys with psychological subtexts but doesn’t deliver. Mina is a broken soul who apparently hates herself. In the bar scene near the beginning of the film, she puts on a wig and calls herself by another name. Who is the real Mina and has she lost her true self? After raising these questions, the script does nothing to make us care, as Mina becomes an enigma the film shows no interest in probing. As Mina, Dakota Fanning does very well and we can see her working to give the role more depth than was allowed.

Shyamalan seems to have an eye for storytelling, but the story here is flimsy at best and ridiculous at its worst. While horror fans know to let rational thinking go when dealing with the genre, the whys and wherefores of this piece become so silly that it is almost impossible to “roll with it”. Spoilers prevent any possibility for an explanation of why the story goes south, but once the ball gets rolling and the creatures are explained, the film loses the few good graces it once possessed.

The screenplay is driven by what Roger Ebert dubbed as the “Idiot Plot”. The late critic explained this as “any plot containing problems that would be solved instantly if all of the characters were not idiots”. The four protagonists seem like good folk, but Shymalan’s script has them doing the most foolish actions that constantly prevent them from making any real headway to escaping their predicament. If one were trapped in a bunker with creatures who only come at night, wouldn’t you use the day to explore every inch of your surroundings? You may want to move furniture, check the walls, and pull up rugs to see if there is anything to help you break free. Perhaps they shouldn’t lie around all day rewatching a DVD of a goofy reality dating show. Get your hands dirty and find a way out!