Review of Split (2017) by Antonius B — 08 Feb 2018

James McAvoy turns in a strong performance here, adding some nice touches to the various personalities of his character(s), and is probably the best thing this film has going for it. Anya Taylor-Joy, Haley Lu Richardson, and Jessica Sula, the three teenage girls he abducts at the beginning of the film, are all reasonably good as well, and pretty besides.

Maybe too pretty, as their casting and the plot feel a bit packaged. I liked the back-story of abuse and implication of going from one beast to another, and the line "the broken are the more evolved", which will resonate with anyone who has suffered while growing up.

M. Night Shyamalan is at least coherent in this movie, but in the end, he doesn't really add all that much to the genre. It all seems done before, and the one 'new' element, the 24th personality, wasn't all that interesting.

I wasn't too jazzed about the concept of setting up the next film either. This is a run of the mill suspense film, which is a shame given McAvoy's performance.