Production Company: Overture Films
Director: Tom McCarthy
Cast: Richard Jenkins, Haaz Sleiman, Hiam Abbass, Daina Gurira
Rating: PG-13 for sexual material and language, and brief drug references
By Gregg Tubbs
(UMC.org)—Sometimes a great little movie comes along that is really worth tracking down. The Visitor is one of those, and so far, the most touching and emotionally complex film of the year. This intimate look at a burnt-out college professor who rediscovers life and love through a chance encounter is both an absorbing character study and an insightful social commentary. It asks us to examine our own humanity, particularly as it relates to immigrants in post 9/11 America and to search our souls to find where compassion ends and a hard heart begins.
Actor and filmmaker Thomas McCarthy’s follow-up to his award winning directorial debut, The Station Agent, offers a touching look at how chance encounters and unexpected relationships can change a life forever. Although primarily a supporting actor, as a director McCarthy has an uncanny knack for pulling dazzling starring roles from other character actors. In The Visitor, Richard Jenkins (TV’s “Six Feet Under”) is mesmerizing as the disillusioned Connecticut economics professor Walter Vale. Walter has been teaching the same course and following the same routine for 25 years, which has become a grey, passionless grind. The recent loss of his wife has caused him to withdraw even further into himself, and his few interactions with students and colleagues have become increasingly perfunctory.
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Gifted at playing the African drum, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) gives Walter (Richard Jenkins) one of his drums and teaches him to play. Copyright © 2008 Overture Films.
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When asked by his department head to travel into New York City to speak at an economics conference, he intends to make short work of the unwelcome break in his routine. He plans to stay in the small apartment that he’s kept in the city for years, but hasn’t returned to in some time. When he arrives, he is shocked to find a young couple living in his apartment—Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) from Syria and his Senegalese girlfriend Zainab (Danai Gurira)—who have been paying rent to a scam artist. They begin to leave, but when Walter learns they have nowhere to go, he offers to let them stay until they find another place.
Over the week of the conference, Walter gets a crash course in multiculturalism and begins to authentically befriend the young couple, especially Tarek, who is open and vibrant in a way that draws Walter out of his shell. He is also drawn to Tarek’s music. Gifted at playing the African drum, Tarek decides to repay his host’s kindness by giving him one of his drums and teaching him to play. Walter’s slow, faltering progress on the drum mirrors his own emotional reawakening as he learns to embrace life once again.
But just as this new-found happiness was unexpected, unforeseen tragedy soon follows. Tarek is an “illegal” without a green card, and when he is wrongfully arrested for skipping a subway fare he is taken to a huge detention center. With Tarek facing deportation, Walter takes a leave of absence and hires an immigration lawyer to defend his new friend. As he desperately fights for Tarek’s release, the sheltered, privileged professor learns what it means to be the exact opposite—powerless, without rights, without a voice, without hope.
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A young couple has been living in Richard’s (Richard Jenkins) New York apartment—Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) from Syria and his Senegalese girlfriend Zainab (Danai Gurira), paying rent to a scam artist. Copyright © 2008 Overture Films.
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With its sympathetic portrayal of illegal aliens,
The Visitor has actually been drawing some heat for having a “political” agenda. But it’s not an overtly political film. It’s really about rediscovering our shared humanity. Through Walter’s journey we learn to dispel stereotypes and see people, no matter how different, as people. Walter learns to delight in new cultures and new experiences—from street musicians to Zainab’s traditional Senegalese cooking. The film also helps us see the world through the eyes of the disenfranchised and asks us to respond with compassion to the refugee, the prisoner and the homeless. Immigration has certainly become a political hot button for some, but as we learn the details of Tarek’s life and how he came to be an “illegal” in America, it’s clear that the issue is anything but black and white. The film challenges us to revisit the words of the Lord, "Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in Egypt.”
Finally, the film reminds us that relationships always involve risk. To open up to someone else, to take them to your heart and make them part of your life is to also share their sorrows and sometimes endure rejection or loss. But as we learn, the “visitor” in the film’s title is Walter himself, who had become a mere visitor in his own life. As he discovers, engaging others and living life more fully are worth it, despite the risks. Track it down and pay
The Visitor a visit!
Study Questions
How did the opening scene when Walter takes a piano lesson gain more meaning as the film progressed? What did it say about his wife? Why couldn’t he settle on a teacher?
What do we learn about the state of Walter’s teaching career in the first scene when he meets with a student in his office? Is Walter cruel to the student or is it something else?
How has Walter’s situation changed from the time he sees the Middle-Eastern man be told to “step away from the window” to the time Walter himself is told to “step away from the window”? Does this phrase take on new meaning for him?
In what ways has Walter changed during the course of the film? Has he changed for the better? How have the other main characters changed? Why do you think the film was called The Visitor?
Do you think relationships come with risks? How does this relate to the film? Do you think Walter would have been better off if he had not opened up to Tarek and Zainab? What about Tarek’s mother?
What does the film have to say about prejudice? Were you surprised by Tarek’s mother’s reaction when she learned her son’s girlfriend was black?
Read Exodus 22:21. Do you think it relates to this film? How? Do you think that it is challenging to teach in “post 9/11” America? (See also Lev. 19:24, Matt. 25:31-46.)
How do you feel about the “immigration issue?” Do you think Tarek got what he deserved? Was Tarek at fault?
Did you feel the film had a political agenda? If so, what was it?
The final scene of the film is a bit enigmatic. What do you think the filmmaker was trying to say? How does Walter’s drum playing reflect his emotions?
Related Links
Official The Visitor site
Theatrical Trailer
