M. Night Shyamalan on Old and Why He Funds His Own Movies

With Old now playing in theaters, I recently spoke to writer-director M. Night Shyamalan about making his latest film. During the interview, Shyamalan talked about why he wanted to make Old over other possible projects, the challenges of shooting on film during a worldwide pandemic, how there are only two labs left that develop film, why spending the extra money to shoot on film was important to him, if he envisions certain actors in a role when he’s writing a script, and more. However, while everything we talked about was interesting and informative, it was towards the end of the conversation where I confirmed something I’d only heard rumors about. Over the past few years, I’d heard Shyamalan funded his own movies. If you know anything about the movie business, you know no one funds their own movies. It’s practically unheard of due to all the things that can go wrong and how expensive it is. But to my surprise, Shyamalan not only confirmed he paid for his recent films, he also revealed he pays for his