With a CV that includes While You Were Sleeping and, now, Phenomenon, it comes as no surprise that Jon Turteltaub is fast earning a reputation as a director of 'feel-good' movies.
Phenomenon has been compared with Forrest Gump, the Tom Hanks hit that took the world by storm, and it is a comparison Turteltaub likes, although he admits modestly that 'Forrest Gump was a rare exception that was hard to recreate'.
'What I like about the comparison is that it's saying this is a film about a good man who is showing that the value of life is in its simplicity. The difference, of course, being that Forrest Gump was an extremely ignorant man while [Phenomenon] is about an extremely brilliant man,' Turteltaub said when he visited Hong Kong recently.
'The film hopes, in a smaller way, to celebrate intelligence, to show that there is a plus side. We don't encourage intelligence in our society very much, especially in the entertainment industry. It's always been the case.
'Even in Shakespeare, there were always fools who were considered wise, but rarely were there wise people considered wise. Maybe because we associate intelligence with authority and we like to tear down authority.' Phenomenon is the latest John Travolta vehicle, in which he plays car-mechanic George Malley. Struck by a mysterious light from the sky on his 37th birthday, Malley changes from small-town hick to genius, baffling all his friends - who turn away from him, except for the town doctor (Robert Duvall), his friend Nate (Forest Whitaker) and his love interest, Lace (Kyra Sedgwick). During his trials, he still manages to see the bright side.
While believing that Phenomenon filled the appeal that Gump did, the 31-year-old director realises that his film lacks the more commercial aspects of the latter.