Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: The Visit (2015)

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Posted by Matt Russell (Member # 8989) on 09-11-2015, 04:17 PM:

As a person who has a love/hate relationship with M Night Shyamalan, this was definitely the comeback movie that not only the audience wanted (myself included), but Shyamalan himself wanted too. Taking the same sort of formula as his olderfilms like Sixth Sense and Signs, the movie revolves around family drama that slowly turns into horror. The twist is, this time the horror is more comedic based. Sort of like the Scream movies, a lot of the "scares" come from what seems innocent at first, but it soon becomes something quite unexpected. The "Nana" character is a play on how grandmothers always do the nicest things for their grandkids, and thus her character acts sweet and granny-ish, but she turns out to have a pretty big demonic side too (no spoilers, that was shown in the trailers [Wink]

). The twist at the end isn't as cringeworthy or as memorable as for say the one at the end of Sixth Sense was, but it's still pretty unexpected. Overall, The Visit is both a throwback to classic horror comedies of the 90/80s while being mixed in with M. Night's classic "secret sauce". It's not as brilliant nor as memorable as some of his older films were, but it's definitely a career revival and will probably make you forget all about The Last Airbender and After Earth.
Film: 3 out of 4 stars
Presentation: 4 out of 4 stars (normally I hate flat, but it works in it's favor for cheesy-themed movies like this)

Posted by Mark Ogden (Member # 43) on 09-14-2015, 06:18 PM:

A teenage girl and her younger brother make a video documentary about their first-ever trip to their maternal grandparents, a strange couple who do creepy and unnerving things after 10:00pm. At the AMC Garden State 16, Paramus, New Jersey.

*****
In spite of what you may have heard, there is no real "twist ending" to this picture. There IS what might be termed a "reveal" or a plot development that is difficult to see coming, but it is nowhere near surprising or ironic enough to be considered a "twist" and, since there is still quite a bit of movie left when it happens, it's not strictly speaking an "ending" either. To put it in terms of the director's earlier work, what transpires is more The Village than The Sixth Sense.

That having been said, this is a really fun and scary movie. The otherwise tired first-person cameraman gimmick is used to pretty good effect, and the tension builds up nicely. The four lead performers are terrific, the young man who plays the kid brother pretty much steals the picture, the last scene in the film is a solo performance by him that earned a rare round of applause from the audience. It's funny too, with some good laugh-out-loud bits, although some business involving adult incontinence is disgusting and a little too much. Still, it's a fun ninety minutes and it just might get M. Night of the hook for his last few duds.