"I remember the moment that it happened, exactly where I was sitting at the table, the speakerphone," he recalled in an interview from his office in a converted farmhouse near Philadelphia. "That moment may have been the biggest mistake that I have to undo over 10 years so the little old lady doesn't go, 'Oh, he's the guy who makes the scary movies with a twist.' "

Eight years later, movie audiences still know Shyamalan as the guy who makes scary movies with a twist. He also has not been able to undo his reputation in Hollywood as a talented filmmaker who will not play by studio rules. After the success of The Sixth Sense, he criticised Disney executives, dared to compare his talent to Steven Spielberg's and Alfred Hitchcock's and has steadfastly asserted his reputation as an outsider by refusing to move from Philadelphia to Hollywood.

His outsider persona continued to work for him, so long as the films The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable and Signs continued to make money. But when his films started to falter at the box-office — his last movie, Lady in the Water, was drubbed by critics and ignored by moviegoers — the Hollywood establishment's support began to wane.

That failure has put considerable pressure on his new film, The Happening, an R-rated horror movie for Fox that opens on June 13. Another failure would harm the Shyamalan name and make it difficult for him to keep full control over his films.

His career illustrates one of the stubborn paradoxes of Hollywood: the film industry loves the myth of the auteur, the rugged individual filmmaker who plays by his own rules, until faced with the reality. Around the time that The Sixth Sense was released, this was a particularly potent idea.

But the studios also need to heed the brutal realities of the movie business. All of these directors have had high-profile stumbles that suggest moviegoers care more about what is on the screen than what is above the title.