Split Is The Biggest Sign Yet That M. Night Shyamalan's Creative Resurgence Is Happening

For those concerned that M. Night Shyamalan's 2015 film The Visit was some kind of fluke, that he would be returning to the level of quality found in The Last Airbender and After Earth in future works, put those anxieties to rest. It turns out we may be in the midst of, at the very least, a nice uptick in the career of M. Night Shyamalan, as his newest film, Split, is a thrilling little romp that's equal parts nonsensical and thrilling. It's basically a B-movie plot superimposed onto higher quality filmmaking and acting, and if that sounds like a complaint, it really isn't at all. Actually, the film's willingness to embrace the nonsensical and absurd is very much part of its own charm.

The Visit Review

Recent directorial efforts from M. Night Shyamalan have stirred up enough fury that they might as well be a road that Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron drive down. Truth be told, the negative reception for such features has been much deserved; After Earth and The Last Airbender are astounding examples of what happens when a motion picture ceases to merely be a film and transforms into an exercise into discovering how abysmal one film can become. Interestingly, aside from the 2008 feature The Happening, Shyamalan has mainly avoided the realm of horror and thrillers that gave him a career in the first place, instead channeling his creativity into the world of sci-fi and fantasy.

Unbreakable Review (Classic Write-Up)

Break Away

When I saw Unfriended this past weekend, I was shocked to see a trailer I (GASP) hadn't seen seen on the internet beforehand. The trailer was for The Visit, a found-footage(?) horror film from M. Night Shaymalan that was chock full of stupidity and terrible dialogue (the best bad line is easily "Would get into the oven to clean it?", which is delivered in a way that briefly makes it seem like the sentence will conclude with the word over) and reminded me of how far M. Night Shyamalan had fallen in recent years.

What Happened To 3D?

If history has taught us one thing, it's that there's one tactic Hollywood knows how to do perfectly; run something well-liked into the ground.  This doesn't always happen to elements audiences take a shine to, but boy howdy did it ever happen to 3D. A novelty in 2009 has morphed into an everyday part of 2015 moviegoing. Not a beloved part per se, but it's certainly there, if only because international audiences love the format. We credit Avatar for bringing 3D into the mainstream, and that's true, but it actually wasn't the first film to utilize the format. Far from it.