The Invisible Man (2020)
Writer/director Leigh Whannell and star Elisabeth Moss take an uninspiring concept and deliver something truly exceptional – a contemporary psychological horror shown from the victim’s perspective, re-examining the classic tale through the lens of abusive relationships, toxic masculinity and gas-lighting.
Premise: Having managed to escape her abusive, controlling boyfriend, the wealthy scientist Adrian Griffin (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), Cecilia (Elisabeth Moss) starts to rebuild her life with help from her sister Emily (Harriet Dyer), their childhood friend James (Aldis Hodge) and his daughter Sydney (Storm Reid). But after Cecilia learns that Adrian has committed suicide, she can’t shake the feeling that he is still haunting her from beyond the grave.
Review:
When they originally announced back in 2016 that Johnny Depp would be starring as the invisible man in the proposed Dark Universe film series (which would follow on from 2017’s The Mummy starring Tom Cruise), I can’t say that I was particularly excited. You can probably imagine the kind of special-effects-heavy, bombastic blockbuster that it would have been, very much in the mould of The Mummy. But then when The Mummy flopped and the plans for the Dark Universe series were quietly scrapped, it seemed that the idea of doing something new with the invisible man were dead in the water, until Blumhouse Productions (the production company responsible for many of the best low-budget horror/thrillers in recent years, including Get Out, Happy Death Day, Halloween and Glass) stepped in.
Even then, despite Blumhouse’s impressive track record, I was still doubtful that there was anywhere interesting left to take the character. H.G Wells’ 1897 novel had already been adapted into a dozen or so different movie versions and a couple of TV series (albeit with very varying degrees of faithfulness to the original novel), and it felt like such a tired concept that ‘Griffin The Invisible Man’ was even a comedy character (voiced by David Spade) in the Hotel Transylvania children’s film series.
“…deals with issues such as domestic violence, coercive control, psychological abuse & gas-lighting…”
But writer/director Leigh Whannell made two creative decisions that really set his 2020 version apart from all the previous ones. Firstly, he decided to shoot the film from the perspective of the invisible man’s victim, rather than tell yet another version where the invisible man starts off essentially decent (even if he is ‘troubled’, as in Paul Verhoeven’s 2000 film Hollow Man starring Kevin Bacon) before then being driven insane as a result of the invisibility experiment. In this version, it’s clear that Adrian Griffin is the type of manipulative, controlling ‘everyday’ psychopath that you could easily meet in real life, long before he becomes invisible.
The second creative decision was to make the film an examination of contemporary issues such as domestic violence, coercive control, psychological abuse and gas-lighting, albeit in a heightened, sci-fi/horror setting. The horror genre is a great place to examine such issues in an allegorical (rather than literal) fashion (just as Get Out tackled racial prejudices), and The Invisible Man is all the more powerful for it. One of the most suspenseful scenes in the film (and there are many) is the opening scene where Cecilia is attempting to escape Adrian’s house in the middle of the night, despite the fact that the scene is completely devoid of any sci-fi or horror elements.
“…there’s no let-up in the unrelenting sense of tension…”
I have to give a lot of credit to Leigh Whannell’s direction for building and maintaining the high levels of tension throughout the film. This is the first film that he’s directed that I’ve seen, and he’s certainly now a director that I’ll look out for in the future. It takes a talented director to make shots of empty spaces where nothing happens seem scary – but Whannell manages it. He and his team also do a fantastic job with the sound engineering, and although I don’t want to give any spoilers away, having an invisible stalker means that the audience is straining for audio clues just as much as visual ones, and Whannell really plays with the sound to great effect. Seeing the event’s through Cecilia’s eyes also means that there’s no let-up in the escalation of the psychological abuse that the audience witnesses, and this generates an unrelenting sense of tension, followed by despair and powerlessness as Cecilia realises what is happening but no one believes her.
The structure of the film means that Elisabeth Moss is in every single scene, and she absolutely carries the film. From the fear she displays in the opening escape scene, to the emotional trauma she conveys afterwards, to the increasing paranoia and desperation Cecilia suffers once she realises her abuser has returned, Elisabeth Moss gives an incredibly physical performance, conveying so much of Cecilia’s inner anguish with nothing more than her eyes and her body language. Whannell also involved Moss in the scripting process, to ensure that the story never lost sight of real women’s perspectives on abusive and coercive relationships.
“…powered by taut direction from Whannell & a gripping central performance from Moss…”
The rest of the supporting cast is great, and Aldis Hodge in particular really makes an impression (and seems to be on the verge of having a really big breakout role). But there is no question that this is Elisabeth Moss’ film, and she’s more than up to the task.
The Invisible Man is a far better film than anyone was likely to be expecting, and it’s powered by taut direction from Whannell, a gripping central performance from Moss, and a smart and intelligent script that avoids all the usual clichés, never forces Cecilia to make stupid decisions just to advance the plot, and delivers some genuinely shocking and unexpected moments. All in all, it’s another intelligent and thought-provoking horror/thriller from Blumhouse Productions, and it confirms Leigh Whannell and Elisabeth Moss as talents to watch out for in the future.
