M. Night Shyamalan’s “Lady in the Water” presents a unique challenge for a critic. It is either great or terrible, either a near-brilliant examination of storytelling and its role in film or an exercise in self-involved egotism. Most critics are going to go with the latter, but I don’t think that’s fair; “Lady in the Water” is far too ambitious and interesting to deserve such quick dismissals.

The film stars Paul Giamatti as Cleveland Heep, a hotel owner who finds in his pool a mysterious woman (Bryce Dallas Howard) straight out of a Korean folk tale about a sea nymph. This nymph, called Story, is supposed to help one of Heep’s tenants, an author, played by Shyamalan himself, whose political writings are supposed to bring peace to the world.

The actual fairy tale aspects of the film take a little while to get into, but Shyamalan invests in them a real sense of fantasy and dread. One of the most technically accomplished directors around, Shyamalan’s visual sense supports the movie from its striking opening to its perfect and lovely final moments.

“Lady in the Water” is much more than a simple fairy tale, however, and that is where it will lose much of its audience. As the movie progresses, Heep becomes aware that he is living in a fairy tale and consciously acts in accordance with the traditional rules and cliches of the genre.

The movie is populated with thinly-drawn characters who serve no purpose outside of advancing the narrative, but Shyamalan makes it clear that this is a conscious decision, going so far as to introduce Bob Balaban as a film critic who complains about the very conventions to which “Lady in the Water” so clearly adheres.

It’s all very interesting and original, but its purpose is unclear. Is the film a post-modern commentary on storytelling in film, or is it an arrogant, childish attack on Shyamalan’s critics? I’m honestly not sure, and I think I’ll need at least one more viewing to figure it out.

Still, for all of the well-made but ultimately uninteresting movies to hit theaters this summer, it’s refreshing and gratifying to find one like this. “Lady in the Water” might not be a good movie - it might even be a very bad one - but it’s more ambitious and provocative than any other mainstream release this year. For that reason alone, it deserves to be seen.

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