The power of invisibility has fascinated generations of
storytellers, and it’s not hard to see why. The ability to act without being
seen carries with it an unlimited and alluring potential. So it’s interesting
that many of the most iconic variations on these stories explore the negative
effect and deadly psychological impact of such power. They consider what might
happen if people were able to separate themselves completely from any moral
accountability, and imagine what they might be capable of if they never again
had to look themselves in the eye.
Writer-director
Leigh Whannell’s re-envisioning of “The Invisible
Man” switches up the traditional perspective, centering the story not on the
person with supernatural abilities, but on what it might feel like to be their
prey.
The film
wastes little time, opening with our protagonist, Cecilia (Elisabeth Moss)
making a desperate, middle-of-the-night escape from an abusive relationship
with wealthy inventor Adrian (Oliver Jackson-Cohen). Adrian is an entrepreneur
in advanced optics technology, and while escaping from his high-tech home, we
see how Cecilia lived under constant surveillance. Even before she fears her
ex’s unseen presence, we see that she’s used to being watched and monitored.
This “The
Invisible Man” gains its power from Elisabeth Moss’s extraordinarily raw
performance. She allows us to see the physical, emotional, and mental toll of
living with this powerful and controlling man. She gains our sympathy by
earnestly playing the tragedy and horror of Cecilia’s circumstances. Though I
look forward to Moss taking on a role where she isn’t being tormented, there’s
no denying she’s good at portraying such suffering on screen.
Whannell (best known for co-creating the “Saw” and “Insidious”
horror franchises) is a confident enough director that he doesn’t feel the need
to show us the abuse Cecilia faced at Adrian’s hands. Everything we need to
know about their relationship can be gleaned from her actions in that opening
sequence, and leaving those details entirely in our minds ends up making him
that much more frightening.
After her
narrow getaway, Cecilia goes to stay with a cop friend, James (Aldis Hodge) and his teenage daughter Sydney (Storm Reid). Suffering
from PTSD, she has difficulty adjusting, and finds herself struggling to adapt
to a life free from her abuser. Then she receives the news that Adrian has
killed himself, and left her a huge sum of money in his will.
There’s a
sense of relief for Cecilia, but the feeling is short-lived as she experiences
increasingly strange occurrences and starts to feel she’s constantly being
watched. During such scenes, Whannell expertly
captures the unnerving sensation of feeling eyes on you when it seems no one
else is around. Soon Cecilia becomes convinced not only that her ex is still
alive, but that he’s found a way to make himself invisible so he can continue
to stalk and torment her, gaslighting her into
feeling as though she’s losing her mind.
Though
drastically changing the plot details, Whannell
embraces the paranoia that underscored James Whale’s 1933 film version of H.G.
Wells’ original novel. The sense that Adrian could be anywhere and capable of
anything infuses his film with an underlying dread.
Whannell’s ruthlessly efficient script invests the story
with some real resonance, speaking to the trauma of toxic relationships, the
fear of technology, and questioning when the world decides not to believe women
who come forward about abuse we can’t see.
Cecilia
knows how unhinged she sounds when she tells people her fear that Adrian has
turned invisible. The doubt that clouds the faces of those she confides in —
whether it be James, her sister Emily (Harriet Dyer), or the authorities — only
serves as further torture.
Shooting the
film largely in medium-long shots, Whannell
(working with cinematographer Stefan Duscio) often
includes a little too much negative space in his framing, drawing our eye to
all the possible places Adrian might be lurking. Panning over to empty hallways
and holding long enough to unnerve us, he patiently gives his audience the
opportunity to dart our eyes around the screen, looking for some sign of
something amiss.
The filmmaker
naturally builds in some visual and thematic nods to Hitchcock, the Master of
Suspense. He loads the film with a number of tense and thrilling set pieces;
lengthy sequences play out mostly in silence, and in general the film’s sound
design is wonderfully immersive and inventive. Benjamin Wallfisch’s
score alternates atmospheric modern electronic elements with flashes of Bernard
Herrmann-esque strings.
This isn’t
the first time Universal Pictures has attempted a reboot of their classic
Universal Monsters properties. 2017’s misguided Tom Cruise vehicle, “The
Mummy,” was to serve as an introduction to their “Dark Universe,” an extended
cinematic portfolio of interconnected big-budget action horror movies utilizing
characters like the Mummy, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the Wolfman,
and many more. It didn’t pan out.
Thankfully,
they decided that smaller scale can be way more effective. If “The Invisible
Man” is a sign of where the Dark Universe is headed — putting these iconic
characters in the hands of filmmakers as interesting as Leigh Whannell — I’m all in to explore where these new nightmares
might take us.
Adam
Lubitow is a freelance writer for CITY. Feedback on
this article can be directed to becca@rochester-citynews.com.
This article appears in Mar 4-10, 2020.
