SPLIT

US, 2016, 117 minutes, Colour.
James Mc Avoy, Anya Taylor Joy, Betty Buckley, Hayley Lu Richardson, Jessica Sula, Brad W. Henke, M. Night Shyamalan.
Directed by M. Night Shyamalan.

Dissociative Identity Disorder, D.I.D., Is also known as Multiple Personality Disorder. Most of us do not know people suffering from this disorder. Rather, we get some ideas from films such as The Three Faces of Eve or Sibyl. What we have now is Split, a 21st-century version of D.I.D., the portrait of a character who has, at least 23 different personalities, one more emerging at the end of the film.

There is always a difficulty in making this kind of film, the danger of sensationalising a situation. However, the screenplay take some pains here to explain the disorder as well as show a therapist working with the patient, alert to the different manifestations. Being a movie, it also dramatises, even melodramatises the character and situations – with the realisation that “it’s only a movie�.

The film has been written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan who came to audience attention in 1999 with what is now a classic, The Sixth Sense, with Bruce Willis. The director continued to pursue stories that involved touches of the preternatural including Unbreakable, Signs, The Village – and then falling out of favour with critics until his most recent film, The Visit. (He also has a cameo role for himself in each film, here working with the therapist and surveillance screens.)

What makes Split a very effective and rather eerie experience of the disorder is the performance by James Mc Avoy. Not all the personalities are shown during the film but there is a sufficient variety for Mc Avoy to make them quite different, appearance, accent, way of communication, sometimes a sense of menace.

And this is all presented in the context of an abduction, three girls taken from a car in a supermarket parking lot, finding themselves confined to what looks like the equivalent of a concrete cell.

Clearly, there is a lot of tension as the girls struggle against their confinement and encounter the different personalities, the most significant of which is a man called Dennis, bespectacled, absolutely obsessive about order and cleanliness, who also seems to be in control of the other personalities (who do not necessarily know of one another). There are two main contrasts, Barry, a fashion designer with a camp manner who is generally the one shown with the therapist, Dr Fletcher (Betty Buckley). There is also a Miss Patricia who also seems to be in some kind of control and, by contrast, a nine-year-old giggler called Hedwig.

On the one hand, there is the emphasis on the girls and how they deal with their situation and the possibilities for escape, especially a girl called Casey (Anya Taylor Joy), more strong-minded than the other two – who is given more complexity by having flashbacks inserted throughout the film to her childhood, her hunter father with guns and a dead deer, to her somewhat sinister uncle.

The film builds up to a climax, a clash of personalities, leaving the audience to ponder what they have seen and the realities of D.I.D. (There is a twist, with a touch of the facetious and shifting the mood of the film, in the last minute, which will please some but have many audiences puzzled.)

1. A drama about split personalities, 23 or 24 personalities in the one person? The medical situation? The psychological situation? Treatment therapy? Manifestations? Dangers?

2. The work of M. Night Shyamalan, his interests, the touches of horror?

3. Philadelphia, the city, exteriors, the streets, the subway station, the school? Supermarket? The contrast with the interiors, the rooms, like cells, the long corridors, the kitchen, Hedwig’s room? Atmosphere? The musical score?

4. The narrative and the focus on the girls, the abduction, the treatment? The insertion of the flashbacks of Casey’s life? Young, her father and uncle, hunting, the tent, with the deer and the rifle, her uncle naked wanting to play animals, the confronting him with the gun? The dramatic times for the insertion of these flashbacks?

5. The three girls, the social, the father offering Casey a lift, Casey wanting to be alone? In the car, the eerie silence, the abduction, the injuries to the father?

6. The girls waking, in the cell, brick and cement, harsh, cold, the beds? Their fear, reactions?

7. The appearance of Dennis, wearing his glasses, shaven head, precise, clean, the various liquids for cleaning the bathroom, changing their shirts if there were crumbs and dirt? His taking the first girl out, her experience?

8. The background of Kevin, his being a weak personality, the others emerging at different times, Dennis and Miss Patricia in charge? Barry emerging? Hedwig? Kevin’s name, the people talking about him – and the final flashback, his severe mother, his being under the bed, her punishing him? The consequences?

9. Dr Fletcher, herself, age and experience, her comfortable room, seeing her clients, her skills, the interactions, her ability to read characters?

10. Barry, his interest in fashion, the emails, the sketches, Dr Fletcher’s suspicions, that Dennis was present? Trying to draw him out?

11. Dr Fletcher and the experts, her theories, the nature of the brain, the experiment with the dog behaving in a schizophrenic way, not aware of the other personalities, multiple personalities as a way of opening up knowledge about the brain and human condition? Her lecture, the questions?

12. The three girls, their characters, interacting amongst themselves? Looking for the hollow walls, the roof, Claire and her getting into the roof, pursued and caught?

13. Looking out the keyhole, seeing the skirt, watching – and discovering Miss Patricia as a variation on the personalities?

14. The girls, invited to the kitchen to have the meal, Marcia running, put into her own cell, like Claire?

15. The appearance of Hedwig, nine, attitudes, childish, talk, et cetera, the reappearances, the touch of mischief, confiding in Casey, sharing the bed, the invitation to the room, to listen to the records, and Casey finding the windows were mere drawings?

16. Casey later seeing the various files on the computer, Orwelll and the recitation of historical information?

17. The various visits to Dr Fletcher, Barry being present, her trying to find Dennis, his admissions, the discussion about the Beast? His attitude towards the rest of the personalities, towards Kevin?

18. Casey, trying to cope, in Hedwig’s room, using the phone for communication, her not being understood?

19. Dr Fletcher coming to the house, the multiple emails, encountering Dennis, the revelation, the Beast, the 24th personality, the Beast and control?

20. Kevin having the job for 10 years, dependable, Dr Fletcher comfortable in visiting, talking, her understanding, asking for the toilet, the locked door and finding the girl? Dennis’s attack, squeezing her, her writing Kevin’s name, death?

21. Dennis, going out, the flowers, at the subway station? In the train, pumping himself up, becoming the Beast, on the train line, running throughout the city? The return home, the indications earlier of cannibalism, eating the girls?

22. Confronting Casey, information about the gun and the bullets, the bullets in the locker, her fear, confrontation, saying Kevin’s full name, firing the gun?

23. Dennis, wounded, mind control, healing himself, disappearing?

24. Casey hiding, her being found, the zoo, her seeing the animals, the police, the questions, the hospital – and her uncle waiting for her?

25. Dennis, the new group of personalities, the Horde?

26. The joke with Bruce Willis at the end, the link with Unbreakable, the musical score?