THE INVISIBLE MAN
He’s behind you…
We’ve seen it!
When it comes to genre fare, Leigh Whannell knows the value of going small. As Saw’s co-creator, he turned limited funds to strong advantage. And with 2018 techthriller Upgrade, he celebrated the grungy joys of lean, mean ’80s sci-fi thrillers, low on budget and high on ideas.
Duly, the Aussie director is a canny choice to kickstart Universal’s directordriven responses to its botched plans for a ‘Dark Universe’ of monster reboots. Forget The Mummy’s CGIwrapped excesses. Late-third stumbles aside, Whannell’s H.G. Wells overhaul emerges as a pared-back, sci-fi-tinged stalker-thriller, drawing heavily on old
CERTIFICATE TBC DIRECTOR Leigh Whannell STARRING Elisabeth Moss, Storm Reid, Oliver Jackson-Cohen SCREENPLAY Leigh Whannell DISTRIBUTOR Universal RUNNING TIME 124 mins TBC
school elements: unseen scares (naturally), a potent core theme and a star you can’t tear your eyes off.
And no, that star is not Mr. Invisible. While previous interpretations centred on the bandaged fella, Whannell’s focus alights on the emotional traumas splintering the face of Elisabeth Moss, whose Cecilia (C for short…) Kass is subjected to extreme feats of gaslighting from the titular terror.
Having escaped abusive husband Adrian (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), C lives in fear until news arrives of his suicide. But why has he left her the fortune from his optics experiments? And who’s leaving bum-prints on seats when she’s home alone?
Ranging from panic-lashed to purposeful with expressive force, Moss gives her features a workout as someone wracked by seemingly implausible suspicions. Much of the film is practically a one-hander, though support comes from Aldis Hodge and Storm Reid as father/daughter housemates and Harriet Dyer as C’s sturdy sis.
With steady character work banking our investment, Whannell tightens the screws. Dead space and dark corridors are well-used to prime our expectations; meanwhile, horror clichés are smartly tweaked to max the suspense and shock value. The bedsheet scene is ingenious, the punch out of nowhere brutal.
Other audaciously nasty twists emerge in public view, though Whannell stumbles over his confidence in the second half. Compared to Claude Rains’ droll tussles with British bobbies in James Whale’s 1933 adaptation, one OTT police ruckus here is unwittingly silly. And one or two elaborate developments stretch credulity.
But Moss maintains her hold on us, walking a fine line between selfcertainty and nerve’s-edge fear without once losing her footing. Other MVPs include Benjamin Wallfisch, whose score throbs with sustained menace, and DoP Stefan Duscio, whose deep images force us to crane in close. Where Universal’s monsters are concerned, let’s hope we see more of its like. Kevin Harley