The Visitor (2007/I)

Director:

Thomas McCarthy

Writer:

Thomas McCarthy (written by)

Release Date:

18 April 2008 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Music | Romance

Tagline:

Connection is everything

Plot:

A college professor travels to New York City to attend a conference and finds a young couple living in his apartment.

Plot Keywords:

Apartment | Professor | Drum | College | Immigrant

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 12 wins & 12 nominations

Cast

Richard Jenkins	...	Prof. Walter Vale
Haaz Sleiman	...	Tarek Khalil
Danai Jekesai Gurira	...	Zainab (as Danai Gurira)
Hiam Abbass	...	Mouna Khalil
Marian Seldes	...	Barbara
Maggie Moore	...	Karen
Michael Cumpsty	...	Charles
Bill McHenry	...	Darin
Richard Kind	...	Jacob
Tzahi Moskovitz	...	Zev
Amir Arison	...	Mr. Shah
Neal Lerner	...	Martin Revere
Ramon Fernandez	...	Cop #1
Frank Pando	...	Cop #2
Waleed Zuaiter	...	Omar

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for brief strong language.

Runtime:

104 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | French | Arabic | Russian

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Canada:PG | USA:PG-13 | UK:15 | Ireland:PG | Australia:M | Sweden:Btl | Sweden:7 | Switzerland:7 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:7 (canton of Geneva) | Singapore:NC-16 | Netherlands:AL | Portugal:M/12 | Argentina:Atp | South Korea:All

Filming Locations:

New York City, New York, USA

Company:

Groundswell Productions

Trivia:

The parking lot in which Walter parks his car after arriving in New York - on East 11th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenue - was torn down shortly after the film was released.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: There is a drop-bolt lock on the inside of the entrance door to Walter's apartment building, but there is no corresponding latch on the door frame.

Quotes:

Ronald Cole: Sir?
Prof. Walter Vale: Yes? Did you find him?
Ronald Cole: He's been removed.
Prof. Walter Vale: Removed to where?
Ronald Cole: Deported.
Prof. Walter Vale: Deported? When?
Ronald Cole: He was deported this morning.
Prof. Walter Vale: How can that be? No, he - Um, sir, is there any way that I could contact him?
Ronald Cole: I don't think so.
Prof. Walter Vale: You don't think so? What kind of an answer is that?
[...]

Movie Connections:

Featured in The 14th Annual Critics' Choice Awards (2009) (TV)

Soundtrack:

Salsera

The Visitor

The Visitor strings together unlikely events in the lives of a professor and his visitors. Remarkably sincere and touching, the unimaginable events feel natural.

Awkward Connecticut economics professor Walter Vale (Richard Jenkins) has essentially checked out from his job, his personality and his life. Walter is forced by circumstance to return to his abandoned New York City apartment. When he returns he meets Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) and Zainab (Danai Jekesai Gurira), who have taken up unauthorized residence in his apartment. Tarek and Zainab teach Walter to live again, to come out of his shell and remind him how unfair life can be.

Writer and director Thomas McCarthy wrote all of the characters in The Visitor with almost contradictory personality attributes which gives them each a complex humanity.

McCarthy wrote Walter Vale painfully dull and bumbling but it was Richard Jenkins who also makes Walter charming and heart breaking. In nearly every setting, Jenkins both makes the audience scrunch their faces at Walter's social inadequacies while simultaneously bringing out our Florence Nightingale instincts. As Walter changes in the course The Visitor, Jenkins keeps the essential qualities of Walter but changes him in surprising ways.

The supporting cast isn't any less remarkable in The Visitor. There is a master of life, a vision of unabashed sadness and an embodiment of sensual motherly warmth. Haaz Sleiman, who plays Tarek, is (damn foxy) full of life as Tarek. His esprit fills Tarek, the audience, the other characters and actors with such vitality. Danai Jekesai Guria plays Zainab, Tarek's girlfriend. So much of Zainab is forlorn despondent dejection. Rich with beautiful hardness and unnaturally attractive pain, Danai Jekesai Guria made Zainab so hard to watch but impossible to pull your eyes away from. Hiam Abbass plays Mouna, Tarek's mother. Her fear is palpable but she never loses her intangible sensuality.

The most remarkable part of The Visitor is the way it organically shows the way life can change un-expectantly, unfairly and without warning and does it with real, raw emotion. Just when you think you've figured out what the movie is about, you slapped with a new reality. It is frightening, timely and angering. Even the ending, which is not the typical movie ending, is emotive in a subtle and realistic way. I was not overwhelmed or underwhelmed by the movie, I was perfectly whelmed; a task indeed.

The pacing is the one complaint I have with The Visitor. The editing could have been much better. There are beautiful scenes sometimes drawn out to boredom. Scenes that were the actors' timing is slightly off are only highlighted by the shoddy editing. The Visitor is an artsy movie but Tom McArdle checked out completely in a few of the scenes.

Slow bits aside, The Visitor is a rewarding film with rich characters, beautiful acting and complexities that might make those people who are quick to tears, cry.