(Also contains a spoiler for Glass (2019).) It is speculated that young Kevin Wendell Crumb and his abusive mother can be briefly seen in Unbreakable (2000), in the stadium scene where David Dunn passes by a woman and a child and senses child abuse just before confronting the drug dealer. In this film it is revealed that Kevin himself is a victim of child abuse, that his mother was abusive, and that his father left by train. Glass (2019) confirms that Kevin's father died in the train crash that began with Unbreakable (2000).
To prevent leaks, the final scene was not included in the shooting script and was also removed from all test screenings.
When Barry last visits Dr. Fletcher, you can see how he opens the front door using Dennis's yellow cloth and, after entering, puts it in his pocket, showing that this person was Dennis pretending to be Barry all along.
After Joaquin Phoenix and the production could not reach a contract agreement, James McAvoy was cast in the lead role.
M. Night Shyamalan first wrote the character of Kevin in Unbreakable (2000), but decided to use him in a separate film 15 years later because there was no time to make him work within the confines of a single film. It is speculated that Kevin appears briefly in Unbreakable when David Dunn uses his ability to sense evil in the stadium (just before confronting the suspected drug dealer). When he touches a woman walking with a small child beside her, he can hear the child scream, suggesting that the mother is abusing the child and that this child is Kevin. However, since Shyamalan initially wrote Split as a standalone film and later decided to connect it to Unbreakable by adding the character of David Dunn, this is most likely a coincidence.
In Kevin's final scene, the music that plays as the camera tilts up the stairs forms the beginning of the theme from Unbreakable (2000), "Visions." As the scene transitions to a restaurant where Bruce Willis appears as David Dunn without being named in the title, his character's iconic theme from that film is heard. This not only reveals that Unbreakable (2000) and this film take place in the same cinematic universe, but also implies that Kevin may not be just a madman: if David Dunn is accepted as a real-life superhero, this would make Kevin's transformation into 'The Beast,' a supervillain, possible.
James McAvoy, as he stated in interviews during the film's promotion, plays nine of Kevin's 23 personalities throughout the film, with "one more cooking in the oven."
According to Anya Taylor-Joy, the kissing scene with James McAvoy was her first on-screen kiss. In an interview, McAvoy said of his role in "it was a little odd first kiss scene" that he was playing a nine-year-old boy with his eyes wide open.
Because this film and Unbreakable (2000) were produced by different studios, M. Night Shyamalan had to get permission from Disney for David Dunn's small role in the final scene.
Near the end of the film there is a scene showing 23 different toothbrushes, one for each of Kevin's multiple personalities. Similarly, the end title sequence is laid out and appears 24 times, accounting for the newly added Beast personality.
The words "Mr. Glass" are the last words spoken in both this film and Unbreakable (2000).
In Unbreakable (2000), Elijah Price's mother describes a long-fingered creature with massive hair, a "soldier villain," who fights the hero with his hands, and immediately afterward inadvertently describes her own son, the main villain who fights the hero with his mind. Interestingly, the physical description of "The Beast" given by his followers is the same as that of the monster who fights the superhero in the comic book drawings. This probably indicates that David Dunn has now found his physical match in The Horde, while his archenemy Elijah is still plotting behind bars.
M. Night Shyamalan stated that making this film was the most difficult job of his career.
Writer-director M. Night Shyamalan joined the cast after meeting James McAvoy by chance at Comic-Con. McAvoy had recently finished X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) and his hair was still a little more than stubble. During the conversation with the soft-spoken man, Shyamalan began to realize that he had found his lead actor, that he would be bald, without makeup, and would look just like McAvoy.
On April 26, 2017, on Twitter, M. Night Shyamalan announced the third "Eastrail 177 Trilogy" film, Glass (2019), in which Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, James McAvoy, Spencer Treat Clark and Anya Taylor-Joy reprise their respective roles.
The film poster showing broken glass resembles the poster for Unbreakable (2000) and implies the fact that both films are in the same cinematic universe, something that is not revealed in this film until the mid-credits scene. This was also confirmed by M. Night Shyamalan, the director of both films. He also stated that he planned to make a third film featuring characters from both films, which was eventually released under the title Glass (2019). Both films have titles that overlap with their main characters. In Unbreakable (2000), Bruce Willis's character David Dunn survives a train crash that leaves him unharmed. The main character of this film, Kevin Wendell Crumb, has split personalities.
The dialogue about The Beast contains a lot of language that exactly mirrors the dialogue about Mr. Glass. Dennis says The Beast is not a mistake. Likewise, in Unbreakable (2000), Mr. Glass says "I'm not a mistake." Characters in both films also use the words "extraordinary" and "human evolution" to describe themselves, and frequently say "the world will understand now." The description of The Beast given by Dennis also matches the description of the wicked soldier described by Elijah's mother: long mane-like hair, muscular, fingers twice as long as normal.
In the film, he appears as Jai, the fast-food-loving janitor of the apartment building where Dr. Fletcher works. After Barry leaves the building, they watch the security cameras. Shyamalan had also played a small role as an unnamed drug dealer in Unbreakable (2000), this film's predecessor. In the next film, Glass (2019), Jai confirms that he and the dealer are the same character.
Split's $9 million production budget is 88% smaller than the $75 million budget of its predecessor, Unbreakable (2000).
It is the fifth M. Night Shyamalan film to gross more than $100 million in domestic box office revenue, after The Sixth Sense (1999), Signs (2002), The Village (2004) and The Last Airbender (2010).
How James McAvoy broke his hand on set: "I broke my hand on Split. I had to punch this door. It wasn't even in front of the camera, actually. It was before I got on camera. But this door had a soft, padded part, and I started punching it a few times before I went into the scene. Because I had to go in full of beans and full of adrenaline. And it was metal, the rest of the door was metal. And I missed that part a bit and broke my hand, and went into the scene white as a ghost and in shock."
The flower in the bathroom is a protea cushion. It takes its name from the Greek god Proteus. In Greek mythology, Proteus had the ability to change his shape and form whenever he wished.
In the final scene, as the camera moves through the restaurant, David Dunn's green poncho from Unbreakable (2000) can be seen hanging on the coat rack a few minutes before David himself appears.
Hedwig tells Casey that there is a CD player in her room and says: "I love Kanye West; he's my man!" In his song "Through the Wire" from the series "Unbreakable, what you thought they called me Mr. Glass?", West references M. Night Shyamalan's earlier film in the same universe, Unbreakable (2000).
The forest shotgun scene strongly recalls the kitchen weapon scene in Unbreakable (2000). At least one of the lines is a direct quote.
The wardrobe's color pattern also corresponds to the color pattern in Unbreakable (2000); purple clothing corresponds to supervillains (Mr. Glass wears a purple coat and drives a purple car, and Dennis, pretending to be Barry, wears a purple jacket on his first visit to Dr. Fletcher) and green for heroes (David Dunn wears a green raincoat, Dr. Fletcher a green scarf, and when Casey's white shirt is torn, The Beast reveals a green tank top).
The names of the 23 identities (according to the computer files): Barry, Jade, Orwell, Kevin, Heinrich, Norma, Goddard, Dennis, Hedwig, Bernice, Patricia, Polly, Luke, Rakel, Felida, Ansel, Jalin, Kat, B. T., Samuel, Mary Reynolds, Ian and Mr. Pritchard. The 24th identity was The Beast, the final personality created by a trigger. Only eight identities are listed in the credits: Dennis, Patricia, Hedwig, The Beast, Kevin Wendell Crumb, Barry, Orwell, Jade.
There are clues about where the girls are held and about Kevin's job. * Their abduction (and the earlier alleged ones) took place at the King of Prussia Mall. Near the mall there is a zoo with an underground maintenance area large enough that the abductions would go unnoticed. * Various animal statues appear in various scenes. * In Hedwig's room there are drawings of animals with their names written on them. * The stone wall in the first locked room where the girls are held is consistent with the walls used in zoo enclosures. * A school trip was mentioned to Kevin's workplace. Kevin has various outfits; possibly from the zoo's 'lost and found'. * Dr. Fletcher mentioned that "The Beast" was created because of the zoo, "your time in this place".
On Kevin's computer there are QuickTime files of his various personalities. The one in the bottom right corner is Mr. Pritchard. This is probably another reference to the character Lionel Pritchard in Signs (2002), also directed by M. Night Shyamalan.
Like the 'superhero' David Dunn in Unbreakable (2000), Casey Cooke's first and last names begin with the same letter, just like comic book characters such as Peter Parker, Bruce Banner, Matt Murdock, Reed Richards, Lois Lane and Lex Luthor.
Throughout the film, Casey not only confronts Kevin Wendall Crumb's various identities, but also has to confront the mental and physical trauma she suffered as a result of her uncle's abuse of her. Also, at the beginning of the film, Casey wears several layers of clothing covering her wounds, and throughout the film's narrative, as she continually confronts her past traumas, she loses one layer of clothing each time.
M. Night Shyamalan hired cinematographer Mike Gioulakis after seeing his work on It Follows (2014), and composer West Dylan Thordson after hearing his music on the TV series The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst (2015).
The film is set in M. Night Shyamalan's hometown of Philadelphia. Throughout the film, Philadelphia Phillies stickers can be seen stuck to various objects.
The TV news anchor is played by Ukee Washington, a real news anchor for KYW, the CBS affiliate in Philadelphia.
As Dennis, in the role of Barry, walks down the spiral staircase of Dr. Fletcher's office, the camera focuses on a stained-glass window in the ceiling. If you count each piece, the total comes to 24, which is likely a hint that there are 24 personalities, not just 23.
The last thing Kevin remembers was being on a bus on September 18, 2014. That was the date Scotland voted on whether to leave the United Kingdom (the majority voted against Scottish independence). Kevin is played by the Scottish James McAvoy, and he is explicitly stated to be pro-independence.
At the AFI Fest screening, Betty Buckley referred to herself as "the crazy lady from The Happening (2008)."
Japanese moviegoers were upset in April 2017 to learn that M. Night Shyamalan, who announced the sequel on Twitter, had spoiled the film for himself, since it would not be released in the country until May.
Dennis describes the Beast as "very muscular, with a long mane, and fingernails twice as long as other people." In Unbreakable (2000), the cover of the first comic book Mr. Glass picks up depicts a hero in a green cape fighting Jaguaro, a villain who matches the description of the Beast, and is likely a harbinger of their confrontation in Glass (2019), the third film in the series.
Sterling K. Brown played Professor Shaw. Although his role was cut entirely from the film, his scenes can be seen in the deleted scenes section of the DVD.
In both this film and Unbreakable (2000), a child points a gun at a family member. In both cases, the child does not fire.
M. Night Shyamalan's previous film was Unbreakable (2000), in which he played the character David Dunn. Willis reprised his role in the sequel Glass (2019), the final film of the trilogy.
It is revealed that the character Kevin Wendall Crumb created his multiple personalities as a result of the traumatic abuse of his psychotic mother, and was also diagnosed with schizophrenia, a combination that caused alternative personalities, distinct individuals within his soul, to emerge. This is almost exactly the 'origin story' of the serial killer Francis Dolarhyde/The Great Red Dragon in Thomas Harris's novel 'Red Dragon.' After nightmarish abuse by a family member, Dolarhyde developed a form of schizophrenia that drove him to kill people. He has been portrayed in the media three times: by Tom Noonan in Manhunter (1986), by Ralph Fiennes in Red Dragon (2002), and by Richard Armitage in Hannibal (2013).
This is the second film collaboration between writer/director M. Night Shyamalan and producer Jason Blum. They had previously worked together on The Visit (2015).
It surpassed Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) as the highest-grossing Blumhouse film worldwide and held the record until it was overtaken by Five Nights at Freddy's (2023).
Kevin often lives in the basement of his workplace.
Fletcher's name may be a reference to Louise Fletcher, who played Nurse Ratched, a nurse in a psychiatric hospital, in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975).
Throughout the film, each of the three captives does something that genuinely angers the three dominant personalities, Dennis, Hedwig and Patricia, and makes them feel betrayed. Additionally, when Dr. Fletcher discovers the triple personalities, which allows the Beast to attack the three captives and do as he wishes with them, she essentially acts in a way that at least causes an act of betrayal through their perception.
Samuel L. Jackson did not know that M. Night Shyamalan was planning a sequel to Unbreakable (2000) until he saw this film. After watching the film, Jackson called Shyamalan, "I was like, 'So are we gonna make this [sequel]?' And Night says, 'Well, it depends on the opening weekend.'" Split was successful, and Jackson returned with Glass (2019), the final film of the trilogy.
James McAvoy played Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men prequel trilogy. In the comics, Xavier's son David Haller/Legion is a mutant with dissociative identity disorder. Legion's arrival on the big screen came with Legion (2017), the same year this film was widely released.
Haley Lu Richardson (Claire) and Jessica Sula (Marcia) had previously worked together on Recovery Road (2016).
It is M. Night Shyamalan's fourth highest-grossing film worldwide, after The Sixth Sense (1999), Signs (2002) and The Last Airbender (2010).
The film grossed $278.5 million, split evenly between domestic ($138.3 million) and international ($140.2 million). It was the 34th highest-grossing film of 2017, far behind the $1.3 billion gross of Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017).