SOUNDBITE: 23 personalities but not a great ending

In the horror/thriller Split, James McAvoy (Young Professor Charles Xavier in X-Men: Apocalypse) plays Kevin Wendell Crumb, a dissociative identity disorder patient with 23 different personalities. This PG-13 film is another from director M. Night Shyamalan.

Casey Cooke (Anya Taylor-Joy who plays Morgan in Morgan) and her two friends Marcia (Jessica Sula, Maddie Graham in Recovery Road) and Claire Benoit (Haley Lu Richardson, Krista in Edge of Seventeen) are kidnapped in the mall parking lot by one of Kevin’s darker personalities, Dennis.

The three girls struggle to figure out which of the personalities they can trust and which are out for blood. The three main personalities we see throughout the film are Dennis, a maintenance man with severe OCD, Patricia, a high class woman who, in a creepy way, cares for the girls, and Hedwig, a creative 9-year-old boy who offers comic relief throughout saying “et cetera” after almost everything. These three often mention to the girls that they are “sacred food.” We briefly see others–Barry, Kevin’s former dominant personality, a fashion designer; Orwell, a history buff; and Jade, a diabetic teenaged girl are all focused on at some point. (Remember the grey beanie, it’s important.)

Kevin’s psychiatrist, Dr. Karen Fletcher, (The Happening’s Betty Buckley) poses an interesting theory that people who suffer from DID have the ability to change their body composition, which is supported throughout the film. It may have even made a believer out of me. As the film progresses, Dennis and Ms. Patricia express their bitterness toward the other personalites–Barry in particular for banning them from “the light,” or control of Kevin’s body. They mention being called “The Hoard” several times because of their “extreme beliefs,” as Dr. Fletcher puts it. These beliefs revolve around a deadly and inhuman 24th personality, The Beast.

Briefly, at seemingly random times, the story is interrupted by Casey having flashbacks. Primarily, we see young Casey on a hunting trip with her father and her uncle (Sebastian Arcelus, Frank from The Best of Me and Brad William Henke, Desi Piscatella from Orange Is the New Black, respectively). While the hardship she’s remembering is eventually revealed–it honestly takes longer than necessary–the relevance to the story doesn’t come to light until the last 20 minutes of the screenplay.

You know that super cliché moment that all horror films seem to have where the protagonist is nearly lost until he or she finds a gun or a stiletto shoe…some miraculous and unexpected weapon? Yeah…I was honestly very proud of the “Oh no! I’m going to die! All hope is lost! Oh, look, a weapon” moment in Split.

The ending, however, is another story. I was disappointed, that’s all I’ll say…except look for a sequel.