Matt Herrick

Even with some tense, well-constructed scenes and a remarkable performance by Elisabeth Moss, The Invisible Man was ultimately a disappointment. Despite it's Blumhouse lineage, it failed to deliver as a horror movie. There were scenes with a palpable sense of foreboding and tension, but it failed to materialize into anything truly scary thanks to some dubious, heavy-handed CGI in the climax, and a failure to develop the villain. As a domestic violence allegory, it's too close to the subject to serve as metaphor and too bound by Hollywood tropes to say anything meaningful. I suspect the decision to start the movie with the main character's escape from the abusive relationship was deliberate; we don't need to see the abuse because we see it's effects. However, the ending devolves into revenge porn and, satisfying as it may be, it fails to acknowledge any lasting effects of the abuse the main character has suffered. The characters are poorly developed, with the meaningful aspects of their relationships flatly stated in dialog rather than conveyed organically. The movie squandered it's time on repetitive scenes of "where-is-the-invisible-man" tension and a protracted, ill-advised climax when it could've been making us care more about the characters. The plot twist was stupid, and everything after it felt tacked on and made little sense under any amount of scrutiny, as if some film exec stuck their fingers in at the last minute.