Ever since giving Donnie Wahlberg his breakout role as Guy Who Killed Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense (spoiler?), M. Night Shyamalan’s career has been spotty, at best. The kind of people who say Amnesiac is Radiohead’s best album also claim Unbreakable is the writer and director’s greatest movie, and half of Signs is pretty good and genuinely scary. Then, yeesh: The Village and Lady in the Water were boring bad; The Happening was hilariously bad; and The Last Airbender was infuriatingly bad. The adaptation of the beloved Nickelodeon animated series turned a profit, though, so Hollywood kept giving Shyamalan more chances to squander his undeniable talent. Like in After Earth, which doubled the Smith, but didn’t double the fun.
Last year, however, Shyamalan received his strongest reviews since Signs (which is to say, 64% on Rotten Tomatoes) with the extremely low-budget The Visit. Could this be the beginning of the Shyamalanissance? We’ll find out on January 20, 2017, when Split is released in theaters. The thriller stars James McAvoy and Anya Taylor-Joy (who was so good in The Witch), but no terrifying grandmas. Hm, this could go either way. What’s the plot?
Though Kevin (McAvoy) has evidenced 23 personalities to his trusted psychiatrist, Dr. Fletcher (Betty Buckley), there remains one still submerged who is set to materialize and dominate all the others. Compelled to abduct three teenage girls led by the willful, observant Casey (Taylor-Joy), Kevin reaches a war for survival among all of those contained within him — as well as everyone around him — as the walls between his compartments shatter apart. (Via)
Finally, McAvoy gets a multi-personality Norbit/Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (with a dash of Room) of his own! Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Split is either going to be skin-crawlingly terrifying, or the funniest movie of the year.
