Old

By: Maggie Stankiewicz

The less you know about Old going into it the better. Written and directed by the ever-polarizing M. Night Shyamalan, Old is a discordant trip to pristine beaches and thinly veiled metaphors. Though equipped with ample source material as an adaptation of Frederik Peeters and Pierre Oscar Lévy’s graphic novel Sandcastle, the film’s logic has about the same amount of structural integrity as, well…a sandcastle. Old, while beautifully shot and competently made, is far from Shyamalan’s best film and equally distanced from his worst. The result is a stressful, visually enrapturing romp film that fails to communicate the point it wishes so desperately to make. 

Old is a high-concept thriller with a simple premise that unravels as the run time drags on. A family embarks on a tropical holiday to an all-inclusive resort that feels more Stepford than Sandals. Things take a turn for the worse when the family is invited to spend the day at a secluded beach with others and a rapper named Mid-Sized Sedan (Aaron Pierre). The body count begins to rise. Guy (Gael Garcia Bernal) and his ill wife Prisca (Vicky Krieps) succumb to the surmounting pressures of pretending to be a healthy couple while on the verge of separation. Their fellow beachgoers each come with their own set of problems, too. Some are interpersonal problems while others are strictly medical. 

Tensions begin to rise as some of their medical problems exacerbate. Tumors grow larger. Mental faculties wear thin. But that’s not all – the children are aging – rapidly. Guy and Prisca’s precocious six-year-old Trent (Nolan River and later Alex Wolff) and his protective old sister, Maddox (Alexa Swinton and later Thomasin McKenzie) blossom into teenagers within mere hours. The beach it seems is making them old. The parents begin to age next and the scenes that follow are some of the most effective representations of body horror I’ve seen on screen in a long time. M. Night Shyamalan is at his best here. There is truth in speaking of the horrors of aging the loss of our senses, our memories and bodily functions. 

The accelerated passage of time feels so sinister, so beyond control and comprehension that few earthly phenomena can contend with the looming feeling of dread. Old compounds the universal fear of aging by stripping away its characters’ autonomy – and worse – the precious time they would have otherwise had. This exploration of aging and how humans reconcile with it, as well as the inevitability of watching our parents and loved ones be taken away by the years, are the most poignant and focused elements of the film. The scenes and moments surrounding these conversations are fractured, confusing and downright uncomfortable. 

The additional cast of characters from the mentally unstable doctor Charles (Rufus Sewell), his emotionally abused wife Chrystal (Abbey Lee) and their daughter Kara (Mikaya Fisher, Eliza Scanlen) to the earnest couple Patricia (Nikki Amuka-Bird) and Jarin (Ken Leung) add complex and stellar performances to a film that doesn’t give them enough time to shine. Instead, many of their characteristics feel like vehicles to an easily predicted ending. When the body count reaches an all-time high and an unshakable sense of nihilism settles in, Shyamalan throws a curveball. The film’s final act, which takes a hairpin turn away from existential dread to pontificate biomedical ethics, is a jarring tonal shift that doesn’t quite stick the landing. 

Old, like many of Shyamalan’s films, is successful at scaring, disturbing and rousing the audience…but it’s not because the writing is good. The concept is intriguing, but the execution falls short. The true mastery of this film is the performances that Shyamalan can pull from his exceptional cast and in the meticulous framing of each shot. Old is a movie best shown, not told. Pay close attention to the framing, the pans and the clever little hints Shyamalan gives the audience through visual cues. If you can focus on the visuals and his mastery of the frame the sloppiness of the writing almost feels endearing.