Review of The Visit (2015) by Jack F — 02 Nov 2017

I must confess: the phrase "found footage thriller by M. Night Shyamalan" did not exactly fill me with confidence.

While it's true that I found much of the backlash against Shyamalan to be extreme (I've stated more than once that, of the films of his I've seen, I feel he has more hits than misses), there's also no denying that the quality of his work took a noticeable dip as the years went on. So the fact that he decided to venture into a subgenre of horror that's had such sporadic results seemed a little puzzling, especially when you consider all the limitations this style puts on a director.

And yet "The Visit" is a surprisingly solid entry in the found footage catalogue. It doesn't really do anything unique or different, but it's creepy, unsettling, and very bizarre (but in a good way). The story does a good job of keeping the audience guessing at the motives of its elderly characters; on a couple occasions, I found myself wondering aloud just what the hell is going on. This is the type of Shyamalan I missed, the guy who infused his earlier films with a palpable sense of mystery.

The story is simple. It involves two teenage siblings (Olivia DeJonge and Ed Oxenbould) who go to visit their maternal grandparents at their farm for a week. The two have never met these relatives, as their divorced mother (Kathryn Hahn) has been estranged from her parents since she was a young woman and hasn't spoken to them in 15 years. But when the grandparents reach out to her to make a peace offering, the children see this as a good opportunity to get to know their lost relatives as well as give their mother a chance to spend some time alone with her new boyfriend.

Becca, the older of the two siblings and a budding film student, decides to document their week and therefore is always behind a camera or a phone or some other kind of recording device (hence, the found footage). Her younger brother Tyler is an aspiring rapper, freestyling inventively about such mundane topics as pineapple upside-down cake. When they get off the train and meet "Nana" (Deanna Dunagan) and "Pop Pop" (Peter McRobbie), they're warm and friendly and everything appears to be going great.

But as the week goes on, Nana and Pop Pop begin to act a bit...off. At first this is chalked up to typical aging problems, but eventually the kids begin to suspect there's something more to it. The old folks' behavior grows increasingly bizarre, particularly at night. Their antics verge from weird but strangely playful to downright threatening. As I said earlier, you will find yourself asking aloud what the deal is with Nana and Pop Pop.

And when the twist is finally revealed, it's a small, satisfying one, not the sort of major revelation the director has become renowned/infamous for. It doesn't come out of nowhere either as there were subtle hints and clues along the way. Actually, the more I look back, it should've been obvious, and yet I was still surprised. Sometimes you can't see what's right in front of your nose, and that's to the movie's credit.

Another plus is that Shyamalan seems to have found his sense of humor again. His films have always embraced deep themes and philosophical profundities, but his earlier movies usually tempered those themes with moments of levity and humor, lest they get a little too heavy-handed. ("Signs" is a perfect example of this.) But his more recent work has eschewed the humorous moments and, as a result, they often seemed pretentious.

But "The Visit?" You could almost make the argument that Shyamalan has made a thriller that doubles as a black comedy, or at the very least a self-aware mild satire of his own work. There's a moment late in the movie that recalls the self-indulgence of some of his more recent films, but the tone and the way it's played onscreen seems so over-the-top ridiculous that it has to be intended as comedic. I just can't believe that we're supposed to take it seriously. And you know what? For me, it worked.

The relatively unknown cast, a definite plus in the found footage subgenre, is very good. The kids are funny and endearing and likable, but Deanna Dunagan is the MVP as Nana. The film gets a lot of mileage out of her when she's in "crazy mode," from her wild-eyed glances, scraggly hair, and guttural growls and snarls. It's a fun performance in a fun movie.

With his latest film "Split" getting good write-ups from the critics, maybe Shyamalan has started to find his way again. If that ends up being the case, we can look back on "The Visit" as his first step in the right direction.