Split (2017)

M. Night Shyamalan walks a thin line between being clever, and overreaching in an attempt to be clever. When he succeeds, his films are astoundingly compelling and fascinating. When he fails, he makes films like "The Happening" and "Lady in the Water". There is no middle ground for Shyamalan. So where does Split fall? Fortunately, Split is a successful Shyamalan movie. Arguably, since Unbreakable, it's his most captivating film. A film that explores mental illness and trauma through an interesting perspective. Strange, considering this film was advertised as a psychological thriller. Does that sound problematic? Bear with me.

Kevin is our focus. He kidnaps three teenage girls and locks them in an undisclosed basement. To their horror, the three girls discover that Kevin isn't who he says he is. In fact, he's not one person, he's multiple. Men, women and children combined. What they don't know is that he is under the surveillance of a psychiatrist, Dr. Fletcher, who tries to crack the code behind his extreme case of Dissociative Identity Disorder, and whether or not it has unleashed powers within him unknown to science. The only other person that may be on to him is Casey (played by Anya Taylor-Joy), one of the three girls who herself understands what past trauma does to a fragile mind. She was molested as a young girl, whereas Kevin was verbally abused by his overbearing mother. Her goal is to escape the basement, while also trying to figure out how to tame the beast of Kevin's psyche. What she doesn't realize is that there happens to be a real beast lurking within Kevin. The 24th personality. A superhuman animal strong enough to bend steel and devour humans.

Split's thesis is both disturbing and endearing, if that even makes a lick of sense. Shyamalan keeps going back to the theme of the "broken" person. How trauma can at times harness untold, unknown abilities later on that can be used as protection mechanisms. Through the lens of a psychological horror thriller, Syamalan want's us to sympathize with Kevin and look into our own perceptions of what mental disorders really are so that we can challenge them. It all demands of a fantastic performance by James McAvoy, and he delivers full on. This is one of the unsung performances of 2017. He received no award show love. That's a crying shame.

There's a lot to take in, but a lot to love about Split.