M. Night Shyamalan has a filmography filled with flops and select few successes. His last successful film, Signs, released in 2002. Three of his fourteen films have a certified score on Rotten Tomato. Despite this, he has managed to recently create an enjoyable film with a truly intriguing story. This film is Split.

Shyamalan's latest creation had a total budget of $10,000,000, and made about $46,000,000 during opening weekend. Clearly, this film was a great success but, unfortunately, would not have been such a success without the superb acting ability of James McAvoy. Although Anya Taylor-Joy was a fantastic choice to portray Casey Cooke, James McAvoy clearly outshines all of the cast. He not only had the task of taking on the personality of one character, but had to create and master the portrayal of six separate personalities: Barry, Dennis, Patricia, Hedwig, the Beast, and Kevin.

Story-wise, Split opens with three, teenage girls who are leaving a mall. While getting in the car, a strange man enters the vehicle and knocks the three of them out with a noxious chemical. The three girls wake in a strange room, and realize they have been abducted. It does not take them long to figure out, mainly Casey, that their abductor is not "normal." Upon closer observation, Casey realizes their abductor has multiple personalities, and she gradually finds ways to manipulate each personality in her favor. Taylor-Joy's character proves to be more intelligent than the other girls, and attempts to make the others listen. Casey is strange yet resourceful and, as the story goes on, the audience discovers a great deal about her past. This element of the film seems completely irrelevant to the story, but the irrelevancy fades away in a crucial moment during the film's climax. Casey and McAvoy's dynamic character play off of each other throughout the entire film, and seem to share some kind of underlying bond. There is a certain suspicion which surrounds the interactions between the two that implies a connection.

This movie can easily be viewed as a scrambled puzzle where, as the story progresses, pieces gradually begin to fall together. Most of the questions are answered in some way. The interchanging story lines are entertaining to view, but the overall pace of the film is slightly slower than it should be. This is mainly due to drawn out scenes of exposition between McAvoy's character and his therapist. Each scene with his therapist is interesting, but poses an unnecessary story line which gets dropped later in the movie. In these scenes, the film's story seems to pause and, thus, interrupts the overall pace of the film itself. Of course, upon reaching the climax, the film reaches the pace necessary to hold the interest of the audience. With the occurrence of the climax, many cringe-worthy scenes fulfill the promise of getting the audience on the edge of its seat. This proves to be a grand payoff for undergoing an extensive set-up process. As a flaw, the film could have done without the additional female characters. Casey would have done well as a single abductee, for the interaction mainly occurred between her and McAvoy. Furthermore, the other two girls seemed to serve more as a shock factor element for the audience, and had little to no contribution to the story itself. Another flaw with this film cannot be fully discussed without completely spoiling the film. I can easily say there seems to be three endings to this film. Although Shyamalan is using this movie as an origin story for the Beast, having multiple endings seem to ruin the mood of conclusion. There are too many moments where the audience is inclined to think the film is at a close, which removes the attention from the importance of "each ending."

Overall, this was a surprisingly entertaining, psychological thriller. Going into this film, I was extremely skeptical due to Shyamalan's track record. Regardless, I was hopeful for I greatly enjoy psychological thrillers. Thanks to a smaller budget, as compared to having a larger budget with previous flops, I feel confident Shyamalan has returned to his roots with filmmaking. Split could potentially serve a return to Shyamalan's previous potential, and I look forward to seeing the Beast again. James McAvoy gave a truly superb performance. I was completely amazed at his ability to take on the personality of so many characters. Hopefully, we will be able to see more of these characters in a future Shyamalan film, which is alluded to in a surprising twist upon the film's conclusion.

Score: 6.5/10