More evidence M Night Shyamalan has lost his way

Rating: 5/10 (24 January 2017)

There seems to be an emerging narrative that he's back. Maybe because the budgets are smaller people now see M Night Shyamalan as some kind of underdog that we should be rooting for. And I do root for him because I think The Sixth Sense is a classic and Unbreakable, Signs and The Village had their moments. But a string of jaw-droppingly awful films - Lady in the Water, The Happening, The Last Airbender and After Earth – obliterated my confidence in him. Some reviewers hailed The Visit as a return to form, but despite a promising concept the idiotically implausible characterization of the boy, who literally can't move when he's afraid, killed it for me.
But that's Night. In nearly everything he does there is a critical plot point that is so contrived and ridiculous it takes me right out of the film and I can never get back in. It wouldn't be so bad if his tongue was in cheek and he had some fun with it. But it's always something banal presented in a profound, meaningful way as if it's some earth-shattering artistic insight. Add Split to the list.
The three central performances are strong. James McAvoy is wickedly convincing as the split-personality psychopath. Betty Buckley has quiet strength, dignity and great intelligence and compassion as his psychiatrist. Anya Taylor-Joy, so powerful in The Witch, pulls you in with her big soulful eyes and makes it impossible not to root for her. But I would argue that the only reason her two friends are taken hostage with her is as a pretext to film pretty girls in their underwear. They are completely superfluous, unless one buys the story's malarkey that the Beast personality needs to eat them to gain strength. (I didn't) Walling the girls off from each other early in the film is a waste. I was much more interested in how they might work together to outsmart their captor and escape.
Casey's (Taylor-Joy's) backstory told in flashbacks undercuts the suspense of the present-day storyline. (It's Night's overworked theme of everything, no matter how seemingly remote, eventually tying together.) It would have been far more interesting, and McAvoy's character much more sympathetic, if Casey had stumbled across him doing something incriminating and he had reluctantly taken her hostage and now doesn't know what to do. But of course that would have been a less sensational approach with less box office potential.
There are nods to The Village (sort of) and Unbreakable (big-time) at the end that are fun, but in the case of Unbreakable, make little sense when you think about it. Night longs for a fusion between the real, humdrum world and the supernatural that, while terrifying, forces us to confront our demons and gives life meaning and purpose. I'm down with that, but he pursues this artistic objective in such a repetitive, immature way it bores. He knows film school tricks and how to manipulate a camera (and sometimes an audience) but I'm always aware I'm watching a movie, I don't get lost in them. He tries too hard to impress and in so doing ties himself in narrative knots that he can only escape through clumsy magic-for-beginner tricks.
Split opened well at the box office on the strength of McAvoy's showy, "Next Hannibal Lecter" performance. And pretty girls in their underwear. But I would be willing to bet the next time Night is given a big budget he'll blow it. Because unlike truly great filmmakers, he just can't seem to think of anything original to say. But man, he keeps trying.