Summary:
After Cecilia’s abusive ex Adrian takes his own life and leaves her a fortune, she begins to experience strange phenomena and suspects Adrian might be behind it.
My Thoughts:
Remember when Universal Studios planned to remake all the Universal Monsters movies and turn them into a Marvel-esque franchise (the planned saga was called: The Dark Universe)? Man, I am so happy that didn’t work out. Thank God Tom Cruise’s “The Mummy” flopped as hard as it did, because we might have had another boring, artless PG-13 schlockfest instead of receiving Leigh Whannell’s “The Invisible Man.” As a side note, when I sat down to review this movie, I released I’d unintentionally seen all three of Whannell’s films: “Insidious: Chapter III” (very blah), “Upgrade” (decent, but familiar), and now this (the best thing I’ve seen from him yet).
Don’t get me wrong: this movie is not perfect, there are plenty of issues with it. There were dozens of times when I thought to myself, “No one would really do something like this unless it were to further the plot,” or “Do people really talk to each other like that?” Still, if I had to choose between an actiony remake of a Universal Monster flick, or a more horror-based remake like this one, I’d choose this horror remake every time. While there may be dozens (and I mean dozens) of tiny problems with this movie, there are some truly great and shocking scenes, and the way this movie handles some of the crazier, more violent stuff in this movie is pretty darn awesome.
If you compare it to movies like “Hereditary” or “The Witch”, this movie is laughable. I’ve given this a 3.5/5 Star rating, because I think this is one of the better MAINSTREAM horror movies I’ve seen in recent memory. It might not be as artistically intriguing as “Gretel & Hansel” or “The Lodge” (the only other horror movies I’ve seen from 2020 thus far), but it is a hell of a lot more fun than both of them. “The Invisible Man” won’t reinvent the horror genre, but it is good escapist entertainment.
“He said that wherever I went, he would find me, walk right up to me, and I wouldn’t be able to see him.”
Cecilia Kass (Elizabeth Moss, “Her Smell”) escapes from her abusive ex Adrian Griffin (Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House), and soon after Adrian kills himself, leaving Cecilia a fortune. Because she is struggling with PTSD from her abuse, Cecilia stays with her friend James Lanier (Aldis Hodge, “Clemency”) and his daughter Sydney (Storm Reid, “A Wrinkle in Time”). Soon, Cecilia begins to experience unusual things which she believes Adrian might be behind. Is she going crazy, or is Adrian somehow torturing her?
Let’s get my biggest qualms out of the way first, because despite this movie’s many flaws, I did enjoy it, and I do think it’s a fun and enjoyable ride. There are so many moments where characters did incredibly stupid things, and even in the very best of scenes, I found myself wondering why characters were doing the things they did. For example, the opening scene shows Cecilia escaping from Adrian’s house. The way that the scene begins is great- it builds tension and sets up plot devices without ever having to say a word, but as Cecilia is actually escaping from the house she does a few things that don’t make a lick of sense. She adjusts a security camera so that she can watch Adrian sleep as she prepares to run away, the purpose being so that she can make sure he’s asleep… but, when she adjusts the camera, she has to use a ladder to twist the camera, and she makes noise. What is the point of that unnecessary risk? Why didn’t she just abscond from the property? If she’s got a huge head start on Adrian, why would she need to know if he’s still asleep? As she’s leaving, she also stops to remove a shock collar from a dog, and as she does that, she stupidly bumps into a car and sets off an alarm. Again, what was the point of taking that risk? The only thing that sequence accomplished is that it startled Adrian awake so that he could chase her… it felt very cheap.
Another thing that sort of bugged me throughout the movie was the uneven quality. Whannell seems very confident when he’s directing the creepier sequences; he’s able to build tension quite nicely, and even in the scenes at the beginning of the film, where Adrian isn’t nearly as violent, he’s able to infuse a fair amount of tension, even if the scene in question is just Cecilia standing in a room and looking around. Whannell doesn’t seem nearly as confident with the more dramatic scenes. Some of the conversations between Cecilia and her sister Emily (Harriet Dyer) are downright awkward. Some of the other scenes between Cecilia and Adrian’s brother Tom (Michael Dorman, “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales”) are incredibly stilted to the point that I almost laughed aloud. It’s also clear that Elisabeth Moss and Aldis Hodge are the most talented actors in the film, and nigh everyone else in the movie pales in comparison to their performances (though Storm Reid isn’t bad).
There are some pretty great scenes in this movie, however. Some of them come as a bit of a surprise, so I won’t say anything to spoil those scenes other than to say this movie knows how to keep you on edge: having an invisible villain sort of keeps you on your toes at all times. He might be standing right next to the dining room table as James and Cecilia eat, or next to Sydney and Cecilia as they play games in the living room. Whannell knows how and when to infuse tension so that as the story goes on, we, like Cecilia, become increasingly paranoid that Adrian might be lurking in the corner at any moment. There are some pretty dark implications that arise towards the middle of the third act as well. Perhaps the best scene of the movie is hinted at in the trailer, and that is a scene where the titular invisible man takes out about six people in a hallway; that scene is done in one shot. It’s brutal and bloody, and it uses a lot of cool camera techniques Whannell used in the action sequences of “Upgrade”. That scene alone bumped my rating from a 3/5 to a 3.5/5.
I also enjoyed the themes. I feel like we’re going through a sort of feminist movement in horror movies (“Midsommar”, “The Witch”, “Raw”, “The Love Witch”), and I for one am very okay with it. The way this movie ends is half-disturbing, half-empowering, and from a horror movie like this, it was exactly the way I’d want it to end.
Verdict:
This movie is filled with plot holes, but I don’t know why anyone would walk into a movie about an invisible killer and expect the script to be drum tight. For what it’s worth, this movie is really fun. I don’t think it’ll be remembered as a classic, in fact I wouldn’t be surprised if this movie faded into obscurity in the next ten years, but if you’re looking for a good way to kill two hours, this isn’t a bad way to do that.
End Note: James Whale’s “The Invisible Man”, which I consider to be one of the best Universal Horror flicks, is, of course, still better than this. Also, I can’t help but wonder what H.G. Wells would think of this…
Review Written By: