'The Visitor' - a dramatic tale about immigration

NEW YORK, New York, USA - The film "The Visitor," starring Richards Jenkins, at first looks like its a simple tale about a depressed college professor who is having trouble getting excited about anything, which predictably would lead to his getting, well, interested in something.

And he does. But it turns out to be way different from what you imagine at the beginning of the movie. And it is anything but simple in Jenkins' performance.

The Visitor turns out to be a stinging indictment of U.S. immigration policies, with enough carefully understated - and damning - scenes to make almost any American's blood boil at the mindless police-state tactics that the film shows the U.S. government employing.


Richard Jenkins takes up the drums

The acting in the movie is superb and I won't spoil the intrigue of what happens by giving away the plot twists and turns.

Suffice it to say that after seeing it, my original idea for a literary journalism piece about immigration has moved way up on the story list. I've heard stories that mirror what the film shows.

Real people here - and outside the U.S. - are caught up in a weird web that is so Kafkaesque, few people want to believe it is real.


Danai Jekesai Gurira and Hiam Abbass


Hiam Abbass

The Visitor - destined to be an American classic?

Maybe.