Alien Corn

There are two kinds of people in the world, according to "Signs," a psychological thriller masquerading as a UFO flick by M. Night Shyamalan ("The Sixth Sense"). The first are people who think someone is watching out for them, who see in seemingly random occurrences traces of a greater power and don't believe in coincidences. The second kind of person assumes we're on our own, and when good things happen (usually to Type One), it's pure luck.

Which will Mel Gibson's sad-sack Episcopal priest, who can't reconcile his wife's accidental death with his faith, turn out to be?

Writer-director-producer Shyamalan has tackled this duality before. Both "The Sixth Sense" and 2000's "Unbreakable" ask whether the supernatural exists, and if so, whether it's benign. In "Signs," the characters' guilt, sorrow, and dread are seemingly answered by spooky messages from beyond and things that go bump in the night.

Rev. Graham Hess lives with his two children and his brother in a rural community outside of Philadelphia, raising crops and asking people not to call him "Father" anymore. It's been six months since his wife died, and his faith is on the shelf with his Roman collar. Hess even refuses to say grace before a meal. "I'm not wasting one more minute of my life on prayer," he snarls grumpily, and then steals his son's French toast.

One day, the dogs start acting funny and the corn rustles strangely. Graham and his brother Merrill, played with decent panache by Joaquin Phoenix, find large swaths of their cornfield smushed in funny patterns. Whatever could it be?

Once announced, the aliens descend swiftly, parking their ships above several cities, though we don't see the beings very often. Shymalayan focuses instead on Hess family dynamics. Leaving Hess' drearily precocious son (Rory Culkin), who's conveniently memorized a UFO book, to explain the alien's intentions, the director alternates between Gibson's flashbacks of beloved Mom and his efforts

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