By Ray Pride Pride@moviecitynews.com
Meeting Manoj, dissing Chris: Bamberger says I felt a powerful force coming off the guy
I’m not quite halfway through the horror show of “The Man Who Heard Voices,” Michael Bamberger’s mash note to his man Manoj Shyamalan and his illumination of destiny for all mankind (or at least for Narfs who must return to the Blue World beneath the earth but are rescued by eagles who soar into the sky with them). But I had to pause for his “Enter, chased by a beer,” for cinematographer Chris Doyle, which suggests that the author does not care for the man. (Doyle anecdotes are pretty much the only reason I want to finish reading this haggard hagiography.)“He asked Paula to get him a cup of coffee with “this much” whiskey, holding his bony thumb and index finger about an inch apart… Doyle was wearing a faded green short-sleeved turtleneck (Who knew that turtlenecks came in short sleeves?) His arms were hairless and tanned. For shoes, he wore bizarre zipper contraptions, thick green rubber pads that might have served as loafers for moon dwellers, unzipped so they flapped around his heels when he walked. His black goggle-style glasses—chic in Soho and few other places—hung around his neck on a black cord. No jewelry. He was just a slip of a man, not much bigger than a jockey, with a weathered face. He looked like Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, all weathered. He wore his hair in the Lyle Lovett manner, an abrupt updo shaved nearly to his scalp on the sides, then puffy and curly on the top.” Contrast with the writer’s introduction to Shyamalan: “And then there was Night, with his drooping earlobes, bug’s-life eyes, curling lips, nasal voice. He was slender and boyish, with gym-built arms and jet-black hair that had a few silver strands hanging just over the tops of his ears. He was wearing high-fashion jeans and a short-sleeved, post-nerd untucked plaid shirt, wide open at the neck… He was warm, friendly, interesting—amazingly energetic. He laughed readily, as if you were saying funny things… I go down the New Age road skeptically, but I felt a powerful force coming off the guy.” Pop quiz: whose company does Bamberger prefer?