After a few high-profile flops, M. Night Shyamalan is back with a suspense-filled film that keeps audiences on the edge of their seat from the start to the very end. His newest thriller, “Split,” follows the plot of three young women kidnapped by a man with multiple personality disorder.
James McAvoy gives a captivating performance as a troubled man name Kevin with 23 distinct personalities. Kevin’s personalities fight among one another for their moment in the sun and McAvoy quite possibly gives the performance of his life as he constantly changes accents, facial expressions, and body language to flawlessly convey each personality.
The kidnapped girls are kept in Kevin’s eerie underground bunker. While trapped in their windowless room, the girls meet multiple of Kevin’s personalities, including a nine-year-old boy named Hedwig and an obsessive-compulsive man named Dennis. In order for the young women to escape, they must manipulate each of his personalities to try and find a way out.
The movie focuses closely on the strangest and quietest girl of the group, Casey, played by promising newcomer Anya Taylor-Joy. Casey’s gut-wrenching fight for survival includes flashbacks to her disturbed childhood and some gruesome scenes considered too graphic for kids under the age of 13.
In true M. Night Shyamalan fashion, “Split” has a jaw-dropping plot twist that you just might miss if you don’t stay until the last moment of the movie. Critics are calling “Split” Shyamalan’s best film since “The Sixth Sense” and we could not agree more.
