Rating: 
Summary: simply awful
Review: Save the $4.00 rental fee. This movie is terrible. Even Mel Gibson, a fine actor, can't save this turkey.
Rating: 
Summary: Ok, everyone just relax for a second
Review: Let's get a few things out of the way regarding these other reviews:1. This is not a sci-fi thirller.
2. This is not necessarily a movie about alien invasion.
3. This is not your typical Hollywood movie at all. I think the reason 'Signs' has garnered all the negative press it has is due to the silly preconceptions of most viewers and their annoying habit of comparing any given movie to a million others. As a matter of fact, that's one thing that makes "Signs" so appealing: you can't compare it to anything else. You cannot compare any of Night's movies to any others, so the exercise is not only useless, it makes most of the reviews here pointless. Unless of course you were hoping for a dramatic "Independence Day," or perhaps a less campy "V." If that's the case, move on. If you allow the movie to be judged based solely on its own merit, any open-minded audience would realize it is unique, ambitious, and almost completely free of anything from the Hollywood director's bag of tricks. God forbid a film maker pay such acute attention to character, setting and screenplay. The bottom line is really this: if you are familiar with Night's other films (and that includes watching the DVD documentaries on each of the previous movies, which, by the way, are incredibly refreshing in their detail) and enjoy his very fresh style, you will like "Signs." It's not a strong or as fully rounded as the other two, but his use of framing, color and subtle emotion is as sharp as ever and will be sure to satisfy. If you don't know Night's other moveis, watch them first. You probably won't like "Signs." I'm a bit of Star Wars/Trek geek myself and love all things sci-fi. But the actual "Signs" and the "Signs" all the geeks writing reviews were expecting (and are commenting on) are apples and oranges.
Rating: 
Summary: Look deeper than the surface, not just an alien movie!!!
Review: This is one of the best movies I've seen in forever. Everyone's talking about special effects and not seeing the aliens enough...blah blah blah. This isn't meant to be a shoot-em-up blow stuff up alien movie. It's thought provoking and meant to make you think about things like family, parenthood, relationships, forgiveness, and faith. All of these are at the forefront of the story, NOT aliens busting through doors and chomping down on people. All of the actors were wonderful and pulled off a flawless performance. The story all comes together perfectly at the end and trust me, you'll want to watch it more than once.
Rating:
Summary: signs
Review: THIS MOVIE IS AWSEOME IT IS SCARY AND FUNNY AT THE SAME TIMES MEL GIBSON IS GREAT ALONG WITH JOAQUIN PHOENIX THE SPECIAL EFFECTS ARE AMAZING I RECOMMEND THIS MOVIE TO ANYONE WHO LIKES ACTION ADVENTURE AND A LITTLE BIT OF COMEDY IT'S WAY COOL!!...
Rating:
Summary: A Truly Frightening Film
Review: This is a great movie that is frightening on an intellectual level. It's not the horror-movie-stupidity kind of scary; it's the bump-in-the-night scary. It's thought provoking and intelligent and should appeal to smart viewers. I think the movie is disappointing to the teenage-boy types that were hoping for "Independence Day" or the horrible "Contact". For proof - read a few of the poorly written and misspelled 1-star customer reviews on this site.
Rating:
Summary: ALL IN YOUR MIND SCARY
Review: A great scary movie without the usual blood and guts...a real mental scare.
Rating:
Summary: Intelligent and complex
Review: I won't go so far as to insult the people who completely hated this movie -- really, to each his own. However, I can say that they are likely the same lot of people that criticize movies like "Contact" because they really do seem to just miss the whole point of the movie. "Contact" wasn't as much about alien contact as it was about the lead character's journey and evolution as a person. Likewise, "Signs" doesn't appear to be about the invasion of Earth. That's just background fodder to illustrate the personal drama contained within a small, fractured family in rural Pennsylvania. The entire movie centers almost wholly around only four characters, something that's unusual in its own right. Not one of these characters is weak, unimportant or unrealized. The acting is excellent, and I was particularly impressed with Joaquin Phoenix. Some of the scenes between Phoenix and Mel Gibson were just extraordinary, and the dinner scene where Gibson's character just breaks down was absolutely heartbreaking. One of the supporting characters, the sheriff Caroline Paski, expertly portrayed by Cherry Jones, was so compelling -- embodying intelligence, patience, and compassion -- exactly what you'd want in a law enforcement person at such a time. M. Night Shymalan's forté in moviemaking seems to be to give many hints throughout the movie that appear to be random or senseless, then to bring them all together at the film's climax. The little girl's obsession with water glasses, the boy's asthma, the uncle's past successes and failures in the minor leagues, the dead wife's cryptic last words... everything serves a purpose at the end and lends a greater meaning to the movie's title than just crop circles. I watched this movie for the first time alone in the dark, and there were some pretty intense moments. Not scary, just nerve-racking and anxious, and when the movie ended, I was ever so slightly leery as I went upstairs to the kitchen. That's a good movie. I took off one star because I found it very distracting, phony, cheesy, and egocentric for Shymalan to cast himself in a fairly important supporting role in the movie. Very regrettable, in my opinion. I understand directors will occasionally pop in as a brief cameo non-speaking role (Peter Jackson, for instance, in "Fellowship of the Ring"), but to cast oneself in a substantial role in one's own movie? I was not impressed, nor was I particularly inspired by his rudimentary acting abilities. Someone, somewhere along the way, should have taken Shymalan aside and said, "Hey, Night, let's step off your ego trip for just a moment and get an actual actor in here for this pretty important role, okay?" I guess you don't say things like that to the director, though. As a whole, however, this is a highly enjoyable movie for the open of mind and able of imagination. The cinematography is top-notch, often revealing just enough to make the viewer long to see what's just beyond the "eye" of the camera. If you can identify subtext and subtleties, and can handle a movie that's marginally about aliens without seeing the White House destroyed in a blinding explosion, you may just find "Signs" to be an engaging and moving film.
Rating: 
Summary: disjointed and obvious
Review: M. Night Shaymalan is a director who seems less interested in coherent plot and logic of storyline than he is in strings of details: interesting and sometimes bizarre events that, when looked at from a different point of view, tell a very different story than the one you think you've been seeing. When this works, as in _The Sixth Sense_, it is incredibly moving and disturbing, and makes you question your own closely held notions of reality. When it doesn't work, as in _Signs_, it comes across as pretentious and self-aggrandizing, a way of saying, "Hey look at me, ain't I profound." In _Signs_, Mel Gibson plays a former priest (Anglican, I'm assuming, tho' this was never made clear) who has lost his faith and left the church six months before on the sudden death of his wife. AS the movie opens, he and his family discover a giant crop circle in their cornfield. Soon enough they discover that similar circles have sprung up overnight all over the world and that they are the markers for an alien invasion fleet. With aliens landing very near all the crop circles, it becomes up to Mel to save his family. There are actually a lot of good things about _Signs_. All the performances are quite good, played with just enough realism. The style of the film is appropriate to the subject, with lots of spooky long shots and odd camera angles. The significant details do add up in a significant way, which in itself is hard to do. And the storyline, though not incredibly original, is one of those that has become a kind of modern mythology, and is treated as such. However, I had numerous problems with this film. The first and most overwhelming is that the ending is so incredibly obvious, given Mel Gibson's character. I knew exactly what was going to happen as soon as I knew he'd been a priest. So the movie becomes more about a man's crisis of faith and the alien invasion seems a really dijointed vehicle to get the point across. The theme and the plot didn't go together in my eye. I kept asking myself, "Why did it have to be aliens?" and I couldn't come up with a good answer. Lots of details are missing from the story, and as they added up, it really began to bother me. Things like, how did a full time Anglican Priest have time to also be a full time corn farmer? And why didn't he ever seem to be farming? And, given the aliens' fatal weakness, how did they stand to be in rural Pennsylvania at that time of year in the first place? And, why do aliens in this kind of movie never have any clothes or weapons? And, what happened to the single adult female character, who you thought was going to be major and then just disappeared? All in all, the movie was a lacework of what Shaymalan wanted you to see, but afterward I realised there were just to many holes to satisfy me. I'm still waiting for that great follow up to _The Sixth Sense_. I'd like to see that it wasn't just a fluke. Unfortunately, _Signs_ makes me think that maybe it was.
Rating:
Summary: This movie isn't worth the plastic of the DVD
Review: ... Here are some things to make you go "Hmmmm": 1. If the alien was so fast that he could jump off the roof and into the cornfield faster than a minor league baseball player, then how come it just stood there and got beat to death with a baseball bat at the end (I didn't give anything away here, I just saved two hours of your life). 2. Do alien invasions really take place in less than 24 hours? 3. When the aliens DO take out the TV stations, you'll get static, not a test signal. And the stations probably won't be back on the air the next day either. 4. Am I missing the point of this movie? I don't think so. The point was abundantly clear in the first 15 minutes. The preacher lost his faith when his wife was killed in a car wreck and got it back when his son didn't die at the end (again, I just saved you). This might have made an OK movie if only they had some real writers write the script, real cinematographers film it, and a real director direct it. Unfortunately, this real movie watcher watched it and I want those two hours of my life back!
Rating: 
Summary: Disengage brain and enjoy
Review: I loved "The Sixth Sense", but was very dissapointed by "Unbreakable". I was eager to see if the director was lucky with the first or just off target with the second. This film is more about a crisis of faith that the Mel Gibson character is having than it is about aliens or crop circles. The tension brought about by the happenings of the film forces the former preacher to come to terms with his beliefs about God, and destiny among other things.
Overall, the first half of the film was brilliant. The thought of what might be and what could happen is almost always more frightful than anything else. I know hearts were racing as we followed through the dark corn fields, hearing unknown creatures rustling among the stalks or as we peered under the pantry door to see what was locked in. The unknown and unseen in the film becomes almost laughable when it is revealed.
The second portion of the film was not good at all. In order to enjoy it, you have to do like the writer/director did when it was made and turn a blind eye to plot holes and things that just didn't make any sense. It might seem odd to say that a story about crop circles and aliens is flawed since it is clearly fiction. But in the "Sixth Sense" it was much easier to forget reality and become entangled with an equally outlandish concept that a boy can see and talk to dead people. The attention to detail found in "The Sixth Sense" was absent in second half of "signs". It is where the movie seemed to fall apart and gaping plot holes and conceptual flaws were revealed.
The movie ends in an attempt to leave you with warm fuzzies as the crisis of faith is resolved and more or less everyone happy as a result. If you can ignore ludicris contradictions and just have fun watching a movie, go for it and have fun. Otherwise, you will be too busy making a list of mistakes to enjoy the movie.
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