If you’re an M. Night Shyamalan obsessive (or, hell, even a well-read fan), you likely know that the filmmaker has spent the last few years collaborating with his daughter, Ishana Night Shyamalan, who served as both a writer/director on Apple TV+’s Servant and a second unit director on Papa Shyamalan’s Old and last month’s Knock at the Cabin.
The two genuinely seem to have enjoyed the process of working together, but now it appears that Ishana Shyamalan is ready to mount her own feature film project. According to a new report over at Deadline, New Line Cinema has lined up Shyamalan to direct a feature adaptation of A.M. Shine’s creepy novel The Watchers. The project will mark Shyamalan’s feature debut, and is being fast-tracked for release next June.
So, what’s The Watchers about? Says Deadline:
The Watchers follows Mina, a 28-year old artist who gets stranded in an expansive, untouched forest in western Ireland. When Mina finds shelter, she unknowingly becomes trapped alongside three strangers that are watched and stalked by mysterious creatures each night.
Says New Line’s President and Chief Creative Officer, Richard Brener:
“We couldn’t be more excited to make Ishana’s first film with The Watchers. Equal parts visual, immersive, and terrifying, the script grips you from the first page and never lets go.”
Ishana Shyamalan began working alongside M. Night on Servant when she was just 19 years old, and ended up co-writing 10 episodes of that series in addition to directing half a dozen of them, including two season finales. Combine that with the in-the-trenches work she experienced with both Old and Knock at the Cabin, and one can easily imagine wanting to spread one’s wings, writing and helming a feature entirely of one’s own. We wish her luck with it, and are curious to see how it all shakes out!
As of this writing, The Watchers is set to hit theaters on June 7th, 2024. In the meantime: stay tuned for further updates on this one as they roll in!
