Early in his career, M. Night Shyamalan was known for making great, twisty horror films, but as the years have gone by, and his budgets have increased, his films have not been able to win over audiences like they once used to. Earlier this year, Shyamalan found success in his first TV venture, Wayward Pines. And it looks like he has rediscovered his big screen mojo this year as well, with The Visit—this film is a return to basics, and by limiting the scope and size of the cast and story, Shyamalan once again thrills his audiences.

Single mother Loretta (Kathryn Hahn) had a falling out with her parents at the age of 19, and hasn’t spoken with them in over 15 years. Her parents have never even met their grandchildren—15-year-old Becca (Olivia DeJonge) and 13-year-old Tyler (Ed Oxenbould). The kids’ father abandoned their mother years earlier, but she has finally found a serious boyfriend. So, to allow their mother to get away and go on a cruise with her boyfriend, the teens arrange to spend a week with their Nana (Deanna Dunagan) and Pop Pop (Peter McRobbie) on their Pennsylvania farm.

Aspiring filmmaker Becca plans to make a documentary of the trip, and try to learn the details of the incident that caused the rift between Loretta and her parents. Meanwhile, her germaphobe little brother, who fancies himself a ladies man, is worried about leaving his two girlfriends behind for a week (though, whether that’s all talk or not is another question). To keep him busy, Becca gives Tyler her old camera so he can help her document the trip.

When the teens first arrive, everything seems great. Nana and Pop Pop are everything they could have hoped for in grandparents. However, they start to witness some freaky events—every night at 9:30p, Nana starts to act very strange. The siblings start locking their door at night for their own safety. Pop Pop tries to explain his wife’s strange behavior away as sundowning, but the kids suspect something else is going on. As their stay progresses, things get weirder and weirder, and Becca and Tyler discover that Pop Pop may have some dark secrets of his own.

The Visit is a wonderfully creepy film that builds its tension at a slow, deliberate pace. By limiting the audience’s view to only what Becca and Tyler can see through their lenses, the audience is on an even playing field—we only know what they know, and experience the same things they are experiencing—rather than being ten steps ahead of the characters.

The Visit doesn’t rely on gore to provide the shock and scares—though it does occasionally make use of the old scream-into-the-camera to make you jump. Instead the filmmakers mainly use the story, setting and characters to more naturally build the tension and scares.

The puzzle eventually all comes together and I felt like I should have figured it all out earlier, but I’m glad I didn’t because the big reveal gave me a huge Holy You-Know-What! moment. The film had me jumping out of my seat several times, and I could literally feel my heart pounding throughout the final act. The actress who plays Nana was phenomenal at being creepy—whenever she was on screen, she had me cringing and wanting to cover my eyes for fear of what she might do. If the actress has grandchildren of her own, I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t want to visit her for a while—and certainly don’t offer to clean her oven!

A lot of the film’s story revolves around the two teens as we are seeing the events through their eyes and thoughts. Both of these young actors do a great job with their characters. I was a bit worried at first that Tyler’s ladies man attitude was going to be a bit grating, but this was not the case, and the interactions between the siblings felt very natural and realistic.

While the film is shot through the eyes of Becca and Tyler’s cameras, this doesn’t mean we get a lot of grainy, shaky footage. The picture on this Blu-ray looks excellent, even in the darker scenes, and captures every creepy detail of what’s going on. The audio track provides clear dialogue, and also makes great use of the surround channels to amp up that creepiness factor. The Blu-ray combo pack includes a DVD as well as iTunes and UltraViolet digital copies of the film. The discs contain about 20 minutes of bonus material including a somewhat useless alternate ending (more of an alternate coda), eight minutes of deleted scenes, a ten-minute making-of documentary and a photo gallery.

What’s Included:
Film: (1:34:01)

Blu-ray:
• 1080p / Widescreen 1.85:1
• Audio: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, English DVS (Descriptive Video Service), Spanish DTS Digital Surround 5.1, French DTS Digital Surround 5.1
• Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish, French

DVD:

• 480p / Widescreen 1.85:1
• Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1, English DVS (Descriptive Video Service), Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, French Dolby Digital 5.1
• Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish, French

Digital Copy (See NBCUcodes.com for Redemption Deadline):

• iTunes Digital HD Copy
• UltraViolet Digital HD Copy redeemable via Universal, Flixster or Vudu

Extras:

• Alternate Ending (2:25)
  This alternate ending doesn’t add or change anything about the film. It is more of a coda rather than an alternate ending—in this version, Loretta reads a letter from parents.
• Deleted Scenes (8:34)
  A collection of 10 deleted scenes. Play All or select from “Check in With Mom”, “An Evening With Nana and Pop Pop”, “Waiting for the White Thing With Yellow Eyes”, “Searching Mom’s Room”, “Someone Was in Our Room”, “Tyler Educates Nana”, “Pop Pop Hates the World”, “Visiting Mom’s Favorite Joints”, “Tyler Internalizes What Happened The Night Before in a Self-Reflecting Manner” and “Becca Considers Reality Television”.
• The Making of The Visit (9:56)
  A behind-the-scenes documentary-like look at the making of the film from the set in Pennsylvania. Writer/director/producer M. Night Shyamalan talks about getting back to basics with a smaller a film versus the big budget films he had been doing, keeping the film feeling like an unscripted first person documentary, casting lesser-known actors, editing while filming, and why he wanted to make this film. Also includes interviews with producer Marc Bienstock, editor Luke Ciarrocchi and production designer Naaman Marshall.
• Becca’s Photos (1:13)
  Auto-advancing gallery of photos of Becca, Tyler, Nana and Pop Pop.

Final Thoughts:

The M. Night Shyamalan who gave us films like The Sixth Sense and Signs is finally back! The Visit is a wonderfully creepy and tense thriller that had my heart pounding by the end. The audio and video presentation on the Blu-ray is top notch, but the disc only contains about 20 minutes of bonus material. However, this is an easy recommendation based on the quality of the film and performances alone.

The Visit is currently available on Digital HD, and will be released on Blu-ray Combo Pack and DVD on January 5, 2016.