The Visit

***The Visit*** is a 2015 American found footage horror film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, and starring Olivia DeJonge, Ed Oxenbould, Deanna Dunagan, Peter McRobbie, and Kathryn Hahn.

The film was released in North America on September 11, 2015 by Universal Pictures. The film received overall mixed reviews, though some viewed it as a comeback for Shyamalan. It was a box office success, grossing $98.5 million worldwide against its $5 million budget.

## Plot

Two siblings from Philadelphia, 15-year-old Becca and 13-year-old Tyler prepare for a five-day visit with their grandparents, while their divorced mother Loretta goes on a luxurious cruise with her new boyfriend. Loretta reveals that she has not spoken to her parents in fifteen years after getting married to her high-school teacher, of whom her parents disapproved. The two kids, who have never met their grandparents, intend to record a documentary film about their visit with a camcorder.

At the train station, Becca and Tyler meet their grandparents for the first time, whom Becca refers to as "Nana" and "Pop Pop". When they arrive at their isolated farmhouse, Becca and Tyler are instructed to never go into the basement because it contains toxic mold, and that bedtime is at 9:30pm, after which they shouldn't leave their room. The first night, an hour past curfew, Becca ventures downstairs for something to eat and sees Nana projectile vomiting all over the house, which frightens her. She tells Pop Pop, who dismisses it as Nana having the stomach flu. He then reminds her not to leave their bedroom after 9:30pm.

Over the next few days, Becca and Tyler notice their grandparents exhibiting more strange and disturbing behavior. Tyler walks into Pop Pop's shed and finds a huge pile of feces. Becca then decides to ask Nana about what happened the day Loretta left home, and Nana begins shaking and screaming. Pop Pop and Nana are later confronted by a woman who was helped by them in counseling; she goes into the backyard with them but is never seen leaving (it is later implied that they murdered her and left her dead body to hang from a tree). Tyler, concerned about the occurrences, decides to secretly film what happens downstairs at night. Nana discovers the hidden camera, retrieves a large knife and unsuccessfully tries to break into the children's locked bedroom.

When Becca and Tyler view the camera footage of Nana with the knife, they contact Loretta once again, begging her to pick them up so they can go home. When she is shown images of Pop Pop and Nana, Loretta panics and reveals to both of them that they are not her parents. Realizing they have been living with strangers all week, Becca and Tyler attempt to leave the house, but the crazed impostors trap them inside and force them to play Yahtzee. Becca later sneaks into the basement, where she finds the corpses of their real grandparents, along with uniforms from the mental hospital they worked at, revealing the impostors are escaped patients. Pop Pop grabs Becca and imprisons her in his bedroom with Nana, who tries to eat her. He then started to psychologically torment Tyler by smearing his face with his dirty diaper. Becca fatally stabs Nana with a glass shard from a broken mirror, she runs into the kitchen and tackles Pop Pop. As Pop Pop starts to get the upper hand, Tyler attacks him and knocks him to the floor and repeatedly slams the refrigerator door onto his head, killing him. The two escape outside unharmed where they are met by their mother and police officers.

In the aftermath, Becca asks Loretta about what happened the day she left home. Loretta states that she got into a huge fight with her parents, in which she hit her mother and was then struck by her father. After that, she left home and ignored their attempts to contact her. Loretta concludes that reconciliation was always possible had she wanted it. She tells Becca not to hold on to anger over her father's abandonment. The film ends as Tyler, to his sister's dismay, performs a freestyle rap recounting the events of their visit.

## Cast

* Olivia DeJonge as Becca Jamison
* Ed Oxenbould as Tyler Jamison
* Deanna Dunagan as Maria Bella Jamison
* Peter McRobbie as Frederick Spencer Jamison
* Kathryn Hahn as Loretta Jamison
* Celia Keenan-Bolger as Stacey
* Benjamin Kanes as Corin

## Production

Filming began on February 19, 2014, under the preliminary title *Sundowning*. Sundowning is the increased restlessness and confusion of some dementia patients during the afternoon and evening. M. Night Shyamalan's Blinding Edge Pictures was the production company, with Shyamalan and Marc Bienstock producing, and Steven Schneider and Ashwin Rajan as executive producers. Later on, producer Jason Blum and his company Blumhouse Productions were included in the credits. Although thousands of American children were auditioned for the film's two lead roles of Becca and Tyler, in what Shyamalan later characterized as a "total fluke", he eventually selected a pair of relatively unknown Australian juvenile actors, Olivia DeJonge and Ed Oxenbould, to portray the film's dual Philadelphia-native teenage protagonists.

## References

1. M. Night Shyamalan Hard At Work On New Supernatural Thriller
2. M. Night Shyamalan is Now Filming Microbudget Horror 'Sundowning'
3. M. Night Shyamalan's Low Budget 'Sundowning' Plot & Cast Revealed
4. M. Night Shyamalan’s THE VISIT Trailer Attached To UNFRIENDED; First Poster In Theaters
5. How Aussie kids Olivia DeJonge and Ed Oxenbould survived the scares of M. Night Shyamalan’s The Visit
6. Interview M. Night Shyamalan On ‘The Visit,’ His First True Horror Film!
7. M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘The Visit’ Has “Disturbing Thematic Material”
8. Review: M. Night Shyamalan's 'The Visit' Is A Glorious Return To Form
9. Review: ‘The Visit’ Is ‘Hansel and Gretel’ With Less Candy and More Camcorders

## External Links

* The Visit on Wikipedia
* The Visit on IMDb
* The Visit on Facebook