I've said it before. I am a M. Night Shyamalan fan. His last movie, "The Visit", was a step in a positive direction after years of stumbling ("The Last Airbender", "After Earth", "The Happening"). "The Visit" wasn't a return to form, that form being my belief that he is a terrific director. Instead, it contained a number of elements and surprises that reminded me of his past successes. I'm talking about his first three films, "The Sixth Sense", "Unbreakable", and my personal favorite M. Night work, the love-it-or-hate-it, "Signs". Now "Split" is a return to that form. It can be added to the list of top notch Shyamalan films.

"Split" looks wonderful. For being shot in what is basically a basement, it always looks interesting. There's no disorientation for the viewer. We are placed within the maze of halls and doorways and never feel lost. Regarding the cast, James McAvoy is great and Anya Taylor-Joy is perfect as the savviest of the abducted teens.

I've talked up this film so far, but as I was watching it, I was having some trouble with all the talk of the "beast". Instead of letting the story play itself out, I was looking for the M. Night 'twist'. Trying to be smarter than a film by attempting to figure it out before it ends is something that I like to avoid. Yet, that's what I found myself doing and it was subtracting from my enjoyment of watching.

Then, when the "SPLIT" title screen flashed, I thought that the movie was over. I started to stand up feeling a bit underwhelmed. But wow...was I wrong. There was an additional scene with a reveal that knocked me over! What an amazing twist! Especially for a Shyamalan fan (and a 'twist' fan) like myself. It's not even that the twist sets up a future film that I want to see, which it did and I do. It's just that it gave fuel to a previous story and offered a universe to a character that Shyamalan can himself build upon or that I can build in my own imagination.