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Plot:
In a world of six billion people, it only takes one to change your life. A college professor becomes embroiled in the lives of a young immigrant couple living in New York City and stumbles into an un...( read more 
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Recent Reviews
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MCT:December 2, 2008
Walter: Tarek is teaching me the drum.
Mouna: How is that going?
Walter: I sound better when he's playing with me.
Richard Jenkins is a character actor many may recognize (although probably refer to him as "that guy") from a long list of film roles ranging from Coen Brother films to Farrely Brother films. Here he gets to headline a very well handled human drama from writer/director Thomas McCarthy who previously made The Station Agent, another wonderful film.
Jenkins stars as Walter Vale, a college professor and widower living in Connecticut. He is bored with his life but does little to express himself to others. A colleague informs Walter that he must present a paper he co-authored in New York and Walter reluctantly agrees to go.
Walter also owns a room in the city and upon returning finds an immigrant couple squatting in his apartment. The couple, played by Haaz Sleiman as Tarek and Danai Jekesai Gurira as Zainab, have apparently been tricked into thinking they were renting from another person, but the misunderstanding soon results in them leaving the apartment. However, out of common decency in seeing they don't immediately have a place to stay, Walter invites them to return for a few days until they find a new place.
Tarek is formerly from Syria and moved away from his mother in Michigan to New York to play music. He plays the Djumbe (a drum). Zainab is from Senegal, is in love with Tarek, and makes and sells her own jewelry.
Soon Walter and the couple form a bond, with Tarek teaching Walter to drum and getting him to open up more, to an extent.
Problems ensue however as a simple mistake leads to Tarek being arrested and placed in detention, due to him actually being an illegal immigrant.
Tarek's mother, played by Hiam Abbass, eventually comes to New York as well, wanting to be present during her son's predicament as Walter selflessly tries to help Tarek and stop him from being deported.
The movie works on a number of levels. Its a drama, but doesn't confine itself to a specific mold. There are comic moments, awkward moments, some brave moments, and some sad moments. It all works well due to skilled the actors are. Its all very believable and down to earth.
The movie isn't much in terms of cinematic style, which isn't really needed, but I did enjoy the ways the drum kept factoring in in various ways.
A very good movie, with a great chance for Jenkins to shine.
Mouna: This is not your problem. You don't have to keep visiting him.
Walter: I want to. -
MCT:November 29, 2008
Walter (Richard Jenkins) is a professor of third world economics who has long since lost any passion for his career. He is shaken out of his complacency when he is forced to return to New York to give a paper that he co-authored, only to discover that his apartment there has been rented out to a young couple, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) and Zainab (Danai Gurira). The new tenants have no idea that the apartment belonged to Walter, and he uncharacteristically takes pity on them, allowing them to stay. This decision impacts all of them, and Walter's passion for life is rekindled by the unlikely friendship. When tragedy strikes the young couple, it opens Walter's eyes to a world that he would never have imagined exists so close to his own home. While it takes a while to get into its groove, The Visitor ends up a very engaging social commentary. Jenkins and Sleiman make for a swell odd couple, eschewing international adversarial stances to lock hands in more subtle expressions of kindness. The moments of their drumbeat bonding are exquisite sequences of restraint and unspoken connection, and both Jenkins and Sleiman commit to the premise whole-heartedly, making McCarthy's plot sing with a realistic outline of benevolence. Jenkins is very good as Vale. He has to walk a very thin line between being inert and engaging. Sleiman and Gurira initially have a too-beautiful, Benetton quality to their presence. McCarthy's movie is less about the trials of illegals in this country as it effects illegals but as it does people like Walter who are inspired to give a damn about them. There's no doubting guys like him exist, or that more of them should.
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MCT:October 29, 2008"Connection is everything"
A lonesome widower and college economics professor finds his mundane existence suddenly shaken up when he befriends a pair of illegal immigrants, one of whom has recently been threatened with deportation by U.S. immigration authorities, in the sophomore feature from The Station Agent director Tom McCarthy. Years after losing his wife, 62-year-old Walter Vale (Richard Jenkins) has also lost his passion for writing and teaching. In an effort to fill the empty void that his life has become, Walter makes a half-hearted attempt to learn to play classical piano. Later, when Walter's college sends him to a conference in Manhattan, he is surprised to discover that a young couple has moved into his seldom-used apartment in the city. Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) and his Senegalese girlfriend Zainab (Danai Gurira) have fallen victims to an elaborate real-estate scam, and as a result they no longer have a place to call home. When Walter reluctantly allows the couple to remain in his apartment, talented musician Tarek insists on repaying his host's kindness by teaching him to play the African drum. Over the course of Walter's lessons, the ageing academic finds his spirits revitalized while gaining a newfound appreciation for New York jazz clubs and Central Park drum circles. Later, Tarek is arrested in the subway and threatened with deportation after police learn that he is an undocumented citizen. Suddenly, in his attempt to help his new friend, Walter's passion for life is unexpectedly awakened. When Tarek's radiant mother Mouna (Hiam Abbass) arrives in the city in search of her son, that passion turns to romance -- something that Walter had previously thought he would never experience again.
Review
The Visitor is a powerful little film about friendship, racial prejudice and re-igniting that 'spark' you thought you'd lost. Director Thomas McCarthy's sophomore film offering (the first being the equally genius 'Station Agent') captures the hearts of the movie-going audience by tackling sensitive issues and yet it is told in a thoughtful and endearing kind of way. The Visitor is a heart-wrenching look at the state of the world we are in today and it is told in a subtle way that will eventually creep up on you. The star of the show is undoubtedly Richard Jenkins as a widowed college professor Walter Vale. In what is quite possibly the best role he's ever done critically, he perfectly embodies the character and minute by minute, the actor slowly disappears as the character he's portraying takes over completely. Other cast members were quite impressive as well most notably the immigrant couple Jenkins' character took under his wing.
The Visitor is another fine example why we don't really need mainstream and commercial cinema to fulfill our movie-going needs. So instead of watching High School Musical or Beverly Hills Chihuahua, why don't you spare an hour and a half of your time to watch this cinematic gem. Highly recommended. -
MCT:October 15, 2008
I love movies about lonely old people. I liked the characters, and all I wanted in life near the end of the movie was for everything to work out for them and for them all to be happy. However, this almost got 3 stars from me because the end of the movie seemed to drag on needlessly for quite a while. I think it's funny that when I first saw the cover of this movie on the shelf, I said to my wife "I'll bet this is about a guy who hears a drum circle and it changes his life", and I was joking but TOTALLY right.
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MCT:October 10, 2008
With "The Station Agent" and "The Visitor", writer-director Thomas McCarthy is two for two in providing great entertainment that's not only heartfelt, funny, and legitimately touching - but entertainment which is so rich it almost heightens our sense of realization. I cannot stress how delightful it is to see films that center around good people. There is no villain in this film, and even in "The Station Agent" the villains weren't necessarily "evil". Instead, both films revolve around a reserved man who is put into a situation that forces him to come out of his shell and become more attuned to the people around him. The formula is charming, and it absolutely works.
Richard Jenkins, a character actor who has appeared in countless films, gives his first leading performance as Walter Vale. He is a widower and lives in a suburban home in Connecticut. As we meet him, he's taking piano lessons - his wife had been a composer, and the piano seems to be his only attempt to hold onto her. But the piano isn't his thing, and his teachers essentially tell him to give up... one even asks if it's for sale. Walter is also an economics professor who has been going through the motions and recycling the same material every semester. When a student approaches him in his office, he rejects late work and mentions that he has yet to get around to making the syllabus (which he later completes by using white out and changing the date from last year).
Walter is assigned by a superior to read a paper at an Academics conference in New York, and he reluctantly accepts (even though the paper isn't his own work). He returns to a Manhattan apartment which he hasn't been to in months, and he discovers an illegal immigrant couple inhabiting it - Tarek (Haaz Sleiman), a musician from Syria, and his girlfriend, Zainab (Danai Gurira), from Senegal. They'd been offered the place by a crooked real estate agent, and despite the misunderstanding, Walter allows them to stay until they find a new place. Tarek is exceptionally friendly and gets Walter involved in percussion, while Zainab keeps her distance. One day, however, at a subway platform, Tarek is asked to provide his identification, which he doesn't have. He is then escorted to a deportation facility and is set to be sent back to Syria. The other key player in the story is Mouna (Hiam Abbass), Tarek's mother, who shows up after not hearing for Tarek in a few days.
The thing that's so refreshing about this film is that it's intentions aren't at all political. For a film that deals with deportation and illegal immigrants in the post-9/11 world, the intentions here are little more than to show the growth of a man through relationships. Also refreshing is that the immigrants aren't viewed as a side show or incredibly foreign to Walter. The artistic intent is not "see, illegal immigrants are people to". While the film has these cultural connections that would be at home in a class discussing globalization, the cultural differences themselves are not what the heart of the film is.
The performance by Richard Jenkins is truly heartfelt, and it's especially impressive that he's able to play such a reserved person in a way that's not boring or pretentious. At the same time, his emotions are so refined that when he breaks out of his shell near the end of the film, it's all the more powerful. I didn't especially love the writing in the scene in question, but there's no denying that Jenkins' delivery almost made you believe Walter would be saying all the things that he did. He's a refreshing change of pace from your typical Hollywood leading roles, and hopefully this will set the spark in his career that "The Station Agent" did for Peter Dinklage.
Another great performance is by Haaz Sleiman, although I did have problems with his character. He was almost too easy-going that it seemed absurd, particularly when he's confined in a prison and retains his smile. The relationship between Tarek and Walter evolves at too quick of a pace, as well. That being said, however, Haaz is incredibly charming in the performance and it's believable that someone so wonderfully eccentric and outgoing could make a guy like Walter step out of his comfort zone.
I didn't like "The Visitor" as much as "The Station Agent", but it's still a wonderful movie that provides great performances, memorable characters, and a powerful message. Thomas McCarthy is a man who should be given all the money in the world to keep making films like this. As long as he makes them, i'll certainly be in line to see them. Don't skip this one! -
MCT:December 4, 2008
Slow moving at first but very powerful and relevant film, the first Oscar-worthy movie of 2008. Led by an incredible multi-layered and heartbreaking performance by underrated film veteran Richard Jenkins. If Jenkins doesn't get an Oscar nomination, it will be a huge injustice.
Comments
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aperfectgentlemanposted 27 days ago -
