Written and Directed by M. Night Shyamalan
*** (three stars)
RATED PG 13
It's been a very rough past few years in the creative life of Writer/Producer/Director M. Night Shyamalan. A cinematic figure essentially written off by critics and audiences alike after the considerably less than stellar efforts of the bedtime fairy tale "The Lady In The Water" (2006), the ecological horror of "The Happening" (2008), the undeniably awful live-action adaptation of "The Last Airbender" (2010), the valiant but failed effort at beginning a new anthology series with"The Devil" (2010), and the brutally panned "After Earth" (2013)--which I didn't even see--Shyamalan, after being hailed by a Time magazine cover feature as the "New Spielberg," was now seen as basically no more than a hack who just got lucky with his breakthrough feature "The Sixth Sense" (1999).
As for me, while I never considered Shyamalan to be the next Spielberg or anyone else for that matter, I too was won over by the skill, creativity and ingenuity of "The Sixth Sense," a film that still holds up strongly in terms of the harrowing, ghostly atmosphere it creates, the depth of the writing and performances and of course, that terrific twist ending that works so masterfully and honestly. For me, his follow-up feature "Unbreakable" (2000) remains his finest effort and I still feel that "Signs" (2002) and even the subversive "The Village" (2004) are worthy successors to his very best films. But as audiences began to throw Shyamalan to the cinematic curb, I still hung on anyway, either faithfully or foolishly.
I guess I really appreciated that M. Night Shyamalan is a filmmaker that carries a certain tone, point of view, personality and cinematic language that just spoke to my personal tastes and if they just did not speak to the masses then so be it. Any lack of connection with critics and audiences doesn't necessarily mean that he lacks talent, does it? For if popularity was the way to measure quality then the latest Michael Bay mega-excess piece of garbage would be the best film of the year...and we all know that will absolutely never happen! But, as I am wont to do, I digress...
Anyhow, I am wondering if M. Night Shyamalan is somehow finding his groove again. This summer, he succeeded with "Wayward Pines," a weird, wild and genre shifting 10 episode limited television series he Executive Produced plus directed the premiere installment. Now, he returns to feature films with the tight, taut little thriller "The Visit," and even as a fan, albeit one whose interest was waning even as I was pulling for him, I have to say that I was happily surprised with the results. And for those of you who have indeed written M. Night Shyamalan off, well, "The Visit" certainly doesn't re-invent the wheel of the horror film but you also may be just as surprised at how effective and entertaining it actually is.
Utilizing the "found footage" hand-held camera style that is now a horror film staple, "The Visit" stars Olivia DeJonge as 15 year old budding documentarian Rebecca Jamison and Ed Oxenbould as her 13 year old brother (and imagined hip hop MC legend in making) Tyler Jamison.
As their lonely and divorced Mother (a strong Kathryn Hahn) prepares for a romantic getaway with her new love interest, Becca and Tyler are preparing for a week long stay with the Grandparents they have previously never met, Doris (a wonderfully unhinged Deanna Dunagan) and John, also known as "Pop Pop" (Peter McRobbie). Since their Mother has been long estranged from their Grandparents, and is also unwilling to discuss the day their relationship fell apart, Becca, with cameras in tow, intends to create a documentary about their visit, hoping to provide some sense of healing, closure and forgiveness amongst her family members.
Upon arriving at Doris and Pop Pop's abode in rural Pennsylvania, both Becca and Tyler begin to notice some oddities surrounding their Grandparents' behavior, which only increases and intensifies at night, as the children are instructed to not ever leave their bedroom after 9:30 p.m. With curiosity firmly piqued, Becca and Tyler are witness to their Grandmother crawling around the house on hands and knees like a raving animal, scrawling and scratching the walls while naked and profusely vomiting in the halls. Events in the daylight hours grow ever stranger as Doris appears to be undergoing a psychological breakdown with odd mood swings and as for Pop Pop, he is repeatedly dressing for a costume party that never occurs, mistakenly feels that strangers are following him and Tyler even discovers a batch of soiled adult diapers in Pop Pop's barn.
Where Tyler grows more suspicious, Becca chalks up the oddities to the fact that these are the strange habits of old people and remains steadfast in her cinematic pursuits. But soon, those strange habits begin to turn deadlier, leading to terrifying discoveries and confrontations during their final night in the house.
M. Night Shyamalan's "The Visit" certainly represents a return to form for the filmmaker as he has taken a "back to basics" approach that often reveals the very best of his talents as well as more confidently displaying a certain subversive and even nasty sense of humor that augments the scares and vice-versa. "The Visit" is a film that is tightly contained and smartly so. Echoing "Signs," the bulk of the film is contained to the Grandparents' house and grounds, therefore increasing the sense of isolation for both Becca and Tyler, as well as intensifying the primal comedy and fear that exists within children looking at unfamiliar adults with quizzically unsure eyes.
And here is where the "found footage" technique, one that I will even attest is a tired horror cliche, actually works very well within the confines of "The Visit." By keeping the action stationary to the house, we are therefore confined to a specific space. By viewing the entire proceedings through the lenses of the cameras that both Becca and Tyler operate, Shyamalan then confines everything we see to precisely what exists within the frame. This technique actually showcases Shyamalan's strengths as a filmmaker as I have consistently enjoyed how, especially within our over-stimulating era of filmmaking with ADD editing techniques and bludgeoning soundtracks, he is able to achieve so much actual tension and intensity by not doing very much at all. He has always been strongest knowing what to show, how much and when, in order to intensify the scares and overall sense of unease and with "The Visit," he accomplishes this feat very well. In addition to the "found footage" technique, "The Visit" is also a film that exists without a musical film score, thus allowing all of the film's many silences to provide the tenor of encroaching doom towards our young heroes, especially in the film's strong final third when all is revealed, and convincingly so. Yes, the "found footage" technique is tired, but so is the conceit of "don't open the door" and "don't go in the basement." And even so, M. Night Shyamalan makes both of those particular elements work well in his favor.
I have to first give credit to Shyamalan for his excellent casting choices as not only do Olivia DeJonge and Ed Oxenbould (who kind of looks like a very young Dax Shepard) resemble each other (and Kathryn Hahn) so strongly, they are very effective conduits for Shyamalan's story which is indeed sending up the horror genre as much as it is embracing it. These are two precocious, intelligent, verbose and sensitive children, enhanced with their own quirks and foibles, who go on and on about "cinematic integrity" and using the names of female pop stars as substitutes for curse words and who certainly ground the film within a certain reality, giving both the comedy and scares ample room to breathe and flow naturally.
A hide-n'-seek chase underneath the house turns from innocent to frightening and then concludes with a fine punch line while keeping the strangeness at the forefront. Grandmother Doris' genteel request for Becca to fully climb inside the oven in order to clean it provides some Gothic humor and queasiness. And those aforementioned adult diapers? Well, for you "germaphobes" out there...well, you'll just have to see that for yourselves but it too provides sick laughs while the danger only grows for the children.
As the Grandparents, both Peter McRobbie and Deana Dunagan are highly effective. While McRobbie's aloofness as Pop Pop underlays the film with a sinister malevolence, it is Dunagan who flies off the handle with a madhouse glee. The twosome play off of each other so very well, providing two layers of darkness that ping-pongs between them, keeping the kids off guard while also delighting us in the audience with how much fun they are obviously having in trying to scare Becca and Tyler to death.
Now, "The Visit" is not perfect by any means. Some of the jokes are repeated one too may times and perhaps, the film could have been even scarier or more psychologically terrifying as it does not burrow under the skin as effectively as "The Sixth Sense" and "Signs," both of which left me considerably rattled. But, the film's epilogue, which has received some criticism, I actually found to be very effective considering the themes of fractured families, anger and forgiveness that are weaved throughout the film's entirety, again presenting that certain point of view that makes Shyamalan a most individualistic filmmaker who still has something to say about our collective humanity, while also trying to scare the pants off of us.
With that being said, I am hoping that M. Night Shyamalan takes whatever good fortune that may arrive from "The Visit" and utilizes it carefully to rebuild the talent that I still attest that he possesses.
No comments:
Post a Comment