Review #203: The Invisible Man (2020)

This review was originally written in 2022.

Gabe's 100 Bucket List Horror Films Review #58: The Invisible Man (2020)

I went into this movie knowing nothing except that everyone I talked to didn't like it. I've heard plenty of people talk about this movie like it was the worst thing to come out of 2020, so I went in expecting a huge stinker. At first, I wasn't quite sure what the fuss was about; the first forty minutes or so isn't terrible- it's not fantastic, but nothing really to write about. Then came a BIG chunk of the film where I was openly angry at whoever made this huge stinker, because a stinker it was. But that, too, passed. The end kind of brought it around (while also ruining it; more on that later) so I can definitely see why people were upset at it, and I definitely think there was a LOT of bad stuff in here, but at the same time, it wasn't so bad. I'm probably going to spoil a lot of stuff so I'll say right here that this is probably a 6/10 movie.

So, what's this movie about? A girl acrimoniously leaves her tech-genius-billionaire boyfriend because he's spent their entire relationship controlling and abusing her. After she escapes, she's living in fear that he'll find some way to catch her, but to her great relief, she finds out that he has apparently committed suicide, and left her a bunch of money. But the relief turns to horror as she begins to feel like a specter of her ex is still manipulating her- did he fake his own death using groundbreaking invisibility tech? Or is she just going insane?

To get this right out here- there are SO MANY THINGS that the protagonist of this film does that are just plain STUPID, and SO MANY THINGS that she COULD have done to benefit herself but didn't. Either the protagonist is a complete idiot who doesn't deserve to live because of how terrible she is at doing the least amount of due diligence to stay safe and keep someone from manipulating her, or her actions are understandable due to grief and stress but at the same time her actions are incredibly convenient for the antagonist (and, less fictionally, for the movie's plot).

For example: she's been living with a friend after the breakup, until one day out of the blue her friend's daughter thinks that our protagonist punched her in the face. She didn't- the invisible man did- but they were in the same room I guess, so she assumes it was Ms. Protag. Friend and daughter leave in anger, tell Protag to be gone when they get back. While they're gone, Protag finds her (dead) boyfriend's cell phone in the house crawlspace (no idea why he had it with him if he faked his death, let alone left it in the crawl space, let alone left it in the crawl space without putting it on Do Not Disturb mode, but whatevs) and on the phone she finds photos of herself and friend's daughter, clearly taken while they were asleep by a third party. She could have forwarded those photos to the friend- to the police- to ANYBODY- as instant, incontrovertible proof that SOMEONE is in fact doing things without her consent. Not only does she NOT do this, she doesn't even take the phone with her! As far as I can tell she sees the photos, sets the phone down, and never again thinks about either thing. Okay, I guess one can gloss over this by pointing out that she was in the middle of a tense situation, but half of the tension of this situation was her friend thinking she's just going crazy. And she has proof that she isn't!

The next example: Protag meets her sister in a public place- a restaurant- so that she can tell her that she discovered the boyfriend's invisibility suit (which she didn't take with her for... some reason, and she didn't take photos of for... some reason, that she did absolutely nothing to back up her story with for... some reason). While they're having a conversation, the Invisible Man walks up, pulls out a knife, slashes the sister's throat in a way that kills her instantly, then places the knife in Protag's hand (all in the span of half of one second), and then Protag... grasps the knife, holds it there, just holds the knife there, in her actual hand, with her full grip on the knife that was just thrust between her fingers, for like ten seconds until some random person in this crowded restaurant glances over and sees the murder scene. Does this movie take place in some kind of world where, if an object touches your fingers, you're obligated to grab hold of it and keep it aloft in your full grip? Couldn't she have just... NOT held the knife? Sure she would likely still be suspected of murder (let's assume for a second that this fine dining establishment doesn't have any sort of cameras, that nobody in the entire room saw the knife floating of its own volition before placing itself into Protag's waiting grip, and also let's assume that somehow the antagonist of this film was able to accurately write an entire, VERY long email to Protag's sister in the exact style of Protag's own writing which was necessitated earlier in the film to establish why anyone would suspect Protag of wanting to kill her sister) but at least it wouldn't be as INCREDIBLY STUPID as just sitting there, holding the knife that just flew around the room to kill your sister.

The chunk of the movie near the end (which leads to her eventually escaping the mental institute) was pretty good, I really enjoyed it, but then I think the movie made another misstep with the final scene. The Invisible Man turns out to (supposedly) not be the dead boyfriend, but rather the dead boyfriend's brother, and then ALSO it turns out the boyfriend is still alive, he's just been tied up in his basement the entire time- which Ms. Protag doesn't believe for a second, assuming instead that his captivity is just another part of his ploy, much like his faked suicide. While I do kind of think it would have been better had he just been dead for real, I can understand where it went instead. However, Ms. Protag then sets up a scenario where she makes dinner plans with the boyfriend, tries to get him to confess, and then (using her knowledge of his security system) sneaks into his basement, steals a copy of the invisibility suit, and kills him while making it look like a (totally unprompted and perfectly natural) suicide. The logistics of this make no sense to me (did she know how the suit operates? How was she able to get down there, get the suit on, kill him, take the suit off, and get back to her spot with perfect hair and clothing all in such a short time frame?) but also, I really REALLY don't like how it's made 100% clear that that's what she did. I think it would have served the movie much better if the ending was even slightly ambiguous. Did she kill him? Maybe. Is there perhaps someone else out there carrying on his legacy that killed him instead? Maybe. This is one of those situations where the mystery would have been way better than "Yeah, I stole a suit and killed him, what of it".

Anyway, if you've read this far you've probably either seen it or you don't care to, but I actually think this one was good, for the most part. Some of it was VERY stupid but the parts that were good were very good. Definitely not the worst thing to come out of 2020, that's for sure.

Overall Rating: 6/10 Cans of Paint that Washes Off Cameras Instantly

Missed Opportunities: Apparently, this film was originally intended to be part of the MCU-style shared universe of the Universal Monsters, but that idea was canned after the failure of Tom Cruise's Mummy remake. While that's probably for the best, I can actually get on board with the ending of this film if Ms. Protag eventually showed up in another movie as the new Invisible Person! It sounds corny but I'd go see it.