I couldn't stand any of the actors in this one. And thought they were all beyond awful.
And while I think the premise was right for The Visit, Shyamalan still has this weird tone deafness when it comes to the behavior of his characters. I spend the entirety of his films just cringing while I watch him fumble through anything that has to do with human emotion. I struggle to think of many directors who are worse at this than him. He's staggeringly bad at it.
That's so interesting to me, the thing that I have always complimented Shyamalan on is how he handles his actors. Starting with Willis (that performance may be kind of his schtick now but it was very subdued for him back then) then Sam Jackson and an even subtler performance from Willis (and arguably my favorite performance from Robin Wright), then somehow reigning in Mel Gibson, which I thought was impossible, and I actually thought Joaquin Phoenix was a ridiculous over-acter until he was in
Signs (only then did I take him seriously), While not as necessary really, I thought every performance in
The Village was spot-on, particularly BD-H (but also Phoenix, Brody, Hurt, and Weaver), and then again in
The Visit (where I particularly thought the child actors were aces (when I usually can't stand child actors), and the boy in particular gave a really good performance, and then
Split, getting something that really worked for me, despite it kinda being the thing I would usually roll my eyes at, from an actor (McAvoy) I didn't realize could do that kind of work and not getting too much from the actors whose characters were in peril and could easily have overdone it.
And then there is one of my favorite performances of all time and probably the winner for
Best Performance In A Movie I Didn't Like, Paul Giamatti's absolutely heartbreaking performance in
Lady In The Water.
Honestly, if there's one thing I've always respected Shyamalan for, it's what he can get from his actors, whether it's a lot from someone I didn't expect a lot from or a very little from someone I think of as always doing too much.