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PLOT: After a series of tragedies, Robert moves with his wife back to her childhood home. After he discovers an old portrait of a man who looks like him, he goes down a rabbit hole to discover the identity of this mysterious doppelganger.
REVIEW: I was shocked to see that The Visitor is coming to us from Blumhouse. Usually, when I see that company, I see quite the marketing blitz. Yet this film has mostly come without so much as a peep. That had me very worried at the onset. Then I watched the trailer and was immediately concerned that I had just been shown the entire film. Unfortunately, that’s kind of true.
The story is just really uninteresting and doesn’t amount to much outside of a light mystery. Sure, it’s interesting that Robert (Jones) moves with his wife Maia (McNamee) into the middle of nowhere and starts seeing paintings that feature his face. I acknowledge that it’s very strange. And it’s strange that he keeps finding paintings. But despite him trying to look into their meaning, there’s never any momentum with the investigation. It mostly just plods along and has no energy. When the twist finally happens it doesn’t leave much of a lasting impact. I think I may have even rolled my eyes. There are small ideas that work (the locusts attacking) but the overarching story doesn’t.
Whether it’s Jessica McNamee or Finn Jones, The Visitor is filled with competent performances. But they don’t really amount to good characters. Everyone feels as stereotypical as you can imagine and almost indignant to the world around them. Robert does have much of a backbone and just kind of meanders around. We see him downing pills but that’s really the most depth his character gets. And while Maia screams with the best of them, that’s really all she does other than an over-the-top monologue.
It’s clear that the film was going for a message of identity and purpose. I’m just not entirely convinced that the angle it takes is interesting enough to carry an entire film. And I’m still not sure that the third act even makes sense. I really enjoy both Jones and McNamee and am really hoping that they’ll have better material to worth with. But this is certainly not it. Even the cult angle (pictured below) is almost entirely fumbled. Which in this day and age is a true shame.
The effects are not very well done, with most of the duality VFX being of particularly low quality. And it always bugs me when multiple generations are portrayed by the exact same actor, with no physical changes outside of a new outfit. It just adds a little bit of silliness and throws any grounding that the film managed prior, completely out the window. One thing I will give it positive marks for is the kills. We mostly see their aftermaths, but they are absolutely brutal. From a crucifixion all the way to a locust swarm, there are some great gross-out moments. But then again, they may have just stood out against the otherwise dull moments happening around them.
The Visitor finds itself a part of the very tired post-pandemic indie film trope of very few people being in an isolated house and something spooky happening to them. And while the performances are good, there’s not much else to latch onto here. The characters are so by-the-numbers that it’s hard to even distinguish between them. There are plenty of ideas presented here (cult, ghost, incest) but none of them really develop in any significant way. I feel pretty confident in saying that this is one visitor that will fade from memory in no time.
The Visitor is ON DIGITAL and ON DEMAND OCTOBER 7th, 2022.
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