Music -- in every sense of that word -- is missing from widower Walter Vale's solitary life in "The Visitor."

Walter (Richard Jenkins) is teaching just one economics class at a Connecticut college but has yet to hand out a syllabus (something that usually happens on day one). Reminded about this lapse by a student, the professor pulls out a bottle of Wite-Out and starts to recycle an old outline.

He eats alone, drinks wine alone and is unsuccessfully trying to learn the piano, an instrument mastered by his late wife. "Learning an instrument at your age can be difficult, especially if you don't possess a natural gift," his gray-haired teacher bluntly tells him.

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'The Visitor'

3 1/2 stars = Very good
Ratings explained

• Starring: Richard Jenkins
• Rating: PG-13 for brief strong language.
• Web site: 'The Visitor'

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He is yanked back to life when he's forced to go to Manhattan to present a paper at a global economics conference and discovers an immigrant couple has been scammed into renting his rarely used apartment there.

Tarek (Haaz Sleiman), an upbeat musician from Syria, and Zainab (Danai Gurira), a reserved jewelry maker from Africa, make a hasty exit but Walter invites them back for a temporary stay. They shift from wary strangers to awkward roommates to friends, especially once Tarek invites Walter to his music gigs and starts to teach him the djembe drum.

But Walter, Tarek and Zainab get an unwanted lesson in immigration crackdowns in post-9/11 America after Tarek is arrested and sent to a detention center for illegal immigrants.

The professor whose connection to the global economy was a dry conference suddenly becomes a lifeline for a man who until recently was an unintentional squatter. Walter also sees a side of the global economy in Zainab, who sells her jewelry from a sidewalk table.

"The Visitor," opening today at the Manor, follows Walter's awakening to the rhythms of life even as Tarek is denied the music that doubles as his heartbeat. When Tarek's mother, Mouna (Hiam Abbass), doesn't hear from her son, she becomes yet another visitor.

Written and directed by Tom McCarthy, "The Visitor" takes the amorphous, overwhelming issue of undocumented workers and puts a face on it. Several, in fact, with complications that have unintended consequences.

Steady, reliable, familiar Jenkins, an actor whose face is better known than his name and who could be the audience's stand-in, is teamed with three ethnically diverse and vibrant actors. If it looks like the part was written for him, it was, and he wears it like a tailor-made suit.

"The Visitor" comes a week after "Under the Same Moon," and it addresses some of the same issues about immigrants but in a subtler way. "Under the Same Moon" turned on the taps full force while "The Visitor" exercises restraint without sacrificing emotion.

It's a little movie about a big issue, done with skill and care.