Split Review (Spoiler Free)

Split is a 2017 supernatural thriller written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. It's one of the most talked about films of the year and is considered Shyamalan's comeback after a long string of duds.



Story

A trio of girls is abducted by a disturbed man named Kevin (James McAvoy) with 23 individual personalities living inside his head, each completely aware of the other, three of whom have taken over Kevin's body, subduing the others so they can't interfere with a dark and sinister plan involving the three girls. Meanwhile, one of the girls (Ana Taylor-Joy) tries her best to break out of their prison by manipulating the more vulnerable personalities into doing what she wants.



Before seeing this movie I was really nervous about it, even when reports started coming in that it was pretty good. Shyamalan hasn't been good since Unbreakable or arguably Signs and now he's coming out with a movie with a concept that would be tricky to pull of for most seasoned directors? I expected it to fall over like a lead balloon. Surprisingly, however, Shyamalan handles the concept really well and a lot of what makes it work, shockingly, are the characters. For his past couple of movies Shyamalan's "characters" have been more like piles of personality quirks and while there's still residue of that in this movie, for the most part all the personalities we get to see have very strong, well, personalities that interact differently with the girls, each other and Kevin's therapist. What sucks, however, is that out of the 24 personalities Kevin has we only get to see about six of them, three of which are given very little screen time. I understand why this was done, so the film didn't feel overcrowded with characters, but it feels like a missed opportunity.



The main big theme of the film is trauma and how one can deal with damaging events in their life and this is explored between the main girl and the antagonist. Kevin, having gone through heavy abuse in his youth, has broken down, his life taken away by these other personalities, degenerating into a monster by the end of the film. Our main character, however, has gone through similar childhood abuse and has come out on the other side calm, collected and ultimately stronger. That's actually not something I've seen in a lot of movies and I'm glad that somebody, even Shyamalan, finally decided to make a film exploring that.



The fly in the ointment of this film is unfortunately the screenplay. A lot of what these people say just don't sound like how people talk. Really long run on sentences and random things said out of freaking nowhere. The worst part of it all, though, is the exposition delivery, because there's just too much of it and it doesn't sound natural at all. In one scene one of Kevin's personalities is talking with his psychiatrist and she says "You're a diligent worker at your place of work they tell me". I understand why they did it because they wanted to make the audience feel as unsure of their location as the girls were, but there could've been a much better way of doing that. In another scene with the same two characters, the psychiatrist says something along the lines of "As you know, blah blah blah". So why are you telling him things he already knows?? And the worst part of all of it, is that the dialogue is used as a substitute for showing things visually. There were so many things I heard in the movie that I wish I had seen because it would've been more engaging and added a bit of mystery to the film. Dear screenwriters: please tell your stories with the camera! That's what they're there for!



Something weird about the characters, though, is that a lot of times they wait too long to do something. For example, the other two girls are thrown into separate rooms away from our main character and they don't try to escape until about an hour into the film later. Why? They were trying to escape every other minute up until this point.



Without spoiling anything, I'm going to talk a little bit about the twist ending (which is probably the coolest twist I've seen in awhile). The twist is actually pretty good at tying up some loose ends you might have had about the movie, especially near the end. However, the unfortunate part is that in order for the twist to make any sense to you, you need to be familiar with one of Shyamalan's three earlier movies (no, I'm not telling you which one). So yeah, brush up on your late 90s-early 2000s cinema.



Technical

I was surprised hat I found the cinematography engrossing, considering cinematography in Shyamalan movies usually take me out of the experience. Instead of doing those long takes that don't seem to have much purpose in the rest of his movies, this one is just shot like a normal thriller. There are still long takes and slow camera movement, but it actually feels like it has a purpose. The slow zoom in of the camera feels like it's ramping up the tension, like turning the wheel on a jack-in-the-box until the clown finally pops out.



The lighting is pretty good as well. In the opening scene, the lighting is grey, setting the bleak tone of the beginning. During their time in the prison, the lighting gets more orange and harsh, making the viewer feel uncomfortable along with the characters. During the climax, where the tension is at it's peak, the orange lighting is still there, but there's much less of it, so we don't know where the villain could pop out of (really trying not to spoil this one).



The acting is a real mixed bag. Ana Taylor-Joy is pretty captivating, but the other two girls are pretty bad. When they're supposed to look terrified or determined they just have a blank look on their faces. However, their mediocrity is overshadowed by how good James McAvoy is. Having to play multiple personalities in the same film would be a serious challenge for almost any actor, so it's a true testament to McAvoy's talents that he manages to pull every single one of them off, giving them each different voices, accents and even body language. It's a really impressive display of acting that should get nominated for something.



Summary: Split is a good movie that could've been fantastic. With more thought put into the writing and more engaging visual storytelling this could've been a classic of the thriller genre. For what it is, though, it's an engaging and suspenseful film with an ending that got me excited for the possibilities it presented and is possibly my favorite Shyamalan movie.