As a huge M. Night Shyamalan fan, I waited nearly two years to watch Split not because I was worried he couldn’t pull it off, but because from the previews I feared it was a glorified Norman Bates tale, which would be hard to improve upon. However, after watching the incredible James McAvoy’s understated yet exuberant performance, along with solid turns by Betty Buckley as his therapist and Anya Taylor-Joy as one of the girls he has kidnapped, I am happy to say my fear was misplaced.
McAvoy plays a man with DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) who has 23 distinct personalities living within. One of those personalities, Dennis, stalks and kidnaps three teenage girls for an emerging 24th personality, one whom most of the others are terrified of. As the girls realize their captor is unusual to say the least, they try to work around his many personalities to escape. Meanwhile, his therapist has been receiving email after email from one personality who is secretly reaching out for help for them all. As the emerging personality grows stronger, the race is on to see if the girls can outsmart all 24 and escape while the therapist tries to convince as many personalities as she can to fight the newcomer and continue their lives as before. The battle is exciting and suspenseful, with a nice twist ending we’ve come to expect from Shyamalan, and which points to another installment in Shyamalan’s many universes.
- Top Scare: Locked room occurrence
- Heartbeats: 3 out of 5
- Gore Factor: 1 1/2 out of 5
- Suspense Factor: 3 out of 5
- Recommended for: 14 and up