Films/DVD Asylum

Posted by tunenut (A) on January 23, 2017 at 20:56:28

In Reply to: RE: Split is absolutely average, another miss by M Night Shallowman. thumbs down from me posted by PhilJ on January 21, 2017 at 14:04:54

My local reviewer wrote that this was a surprising return to form, that he managed to pull off another surprise ending that recontextualizes the whole story, and that, in these social media days, you should see it before the surprise is spoiled.

So I was game.

My background: I saw the 6th Sense when it came out. I did not see it coming and the ending worked to perfection for me. It built a huge reservoir of good will toward his future work, good will he squandered with one turkey after another until I lost interest.

So I waited for the big surprise. The last scene came and went and my reaction was "huh?"

I came home, went to youtube and found out what the big twist was. The Shyamalan super fans are floored by it. When I understood it, I cared not very much at all.

So discarding the twist, it's yet another psycho kidnapping teenage girls with a not too subtle sexual subtext. The psycho in this case is a man with 23 personalities, which provides the uniqueness and gives James McAvoy a chance to show some chops (he does OK and resists the urge to ham it up too much).

But it was all in all not much and I will again be avoiding his future movies.