The Invitation – review

Director: Jessica M. Thompson

Release date: 2022

Contains spoilers

The Invitation was a film that was spoilt by “the twist” in the trailer, or so people have complained, but the primary twist – that this a vampire tale – was no twist at all to those of us versed in Dracula and its lore. From the moment the protagonist Evie (Nathalie Emmanuel) arrives in England the mentions make it clear that this is, in fact, a Dracula movie. Now Dracula, the name, is not uttered once (though it is implied in suspended dialogue) but this is not just a film that uses an odd name to situate the film’s place in the vampire megatext, as we’ll see.

Nathalie Emmanuel as Evie

The film also has two versions with the US home release having an R rated version next to the tamer theatrical release. Having watched this in the theatre I have waited to review until getting the Blu-Ray to compare and, to be honest, the unrated version really doesn’t add much to the mix – but the wait and re-watch did consolidate my feelings on the score and initial reaction.

suicide

We start in a Gothic mansion, the set looking magnificent and the building establishing itself both as glorious eye-candy and also a contested space through the run of the film. We follow a POV camera and then a pair of legs – later revealed to belong to head butler Fields (Sean Pertwee). He unlocks a door after knocking saying to the inhabitant, Emmaline (Virág Bárány, Dracula (2013)), that they are worried, she must eat and she must be weak as she has not fed. She manages to push past him and, after getting a piano string from a music room, holds a bust as she leaps from the landing, decapitating herself.

DNA results

Over in New York Evie is working as a server for a caterer at a corporate event for DNA ancestry company “Unlock Your Past”. In the kitchen she and her friend Grace (Courtney Taylor) discuss the inappropriate behaviours they have had to put up with at the event and Grace has got them swag bags – these ones containing a free DNA test. We discover that Evie is broke (her rent is past due), she is an artist working in ceramics and her mother has passed (we discover later just a few months before, of cancer). She takes the test.

Hugh Skinner as Oliver

Grace is at Evie's apartment when the DNA test comes back. Now IMDb suggests a DNA test offering you names and addresses of cousins is not possible and therefore a goof. I beg to differ, such DNA companies will highlight cousins (and quite distant ones at that) who have also used the services and will allow messages to be sent between (if consent for such reveal has been given). Evie is contacted by British cousin Oliver (Hugh Skinner) who happens to be in New York for work the next week and wants to meet up – Grace is cynical but Evie is looking for connection and so meets him. Just to note that I have seen complaints about Grace stating that Oliver is the whitest guy she’s ever seen, suggesting the film is being “woke”. Firstly, there is nothing wrong with woke. More importantly two African American ladies seeing a clearly Anglo-Saxon relative may well say that.

New Carfax

Oliver proves to be bumbling, enthusiastic and charming. He informs Evie that the whole family in England is very excited at having found her and relays her family history in which she is the product of a scandal when her great-grandmother, Emmaline Alexander, had an affair with a footman and a child ensued. The footman took and cared for the child. There is to be a wedding in the family, to the de Villes, and she should attend. She can’t afford that but Oliver offers her his air miles to get her over to Whitby.

Thomas Doherty as Walt

So let us take stock. We are near Whitby (actually not at all, by location, the film being shot in Hungary and those who know Whitby and the surrounding countryside can see that immediately) and the family involved is the De Ville’s – indeed the estate belongs to Walt de Ville (Thomas Doherty, also Dracula (2013)). So, for the viewer who knows Dracula, we know the connection with Whitby and de Ville was a pseudonym the Count used in England for business purposes. When they get to New Carfax Abbey – the name of the estate – the connection is obvious.

Walt and Evie

So, to cut the plot down to essential elements, Evie is a fish out of water and I have read some people comparing this to Get Out and that is an obvious correlation. However, I think the the trope is more to do with her being a free-spirited American facing a very privileged level of British/European society. Yes, race is touched on but it is more a class issue. Walt, however, is charming and Evie is drawn to him and when she meets bridesmaids Lucy (Alana Boden) and Viktoria (Stephanie Corneliussen), she gets on with the former but dislikes the latter (who is bitchy). There is to be a wedding, of course, but it is Evie who will becoming Walt’s third bride (with Lucy and Viktoria being the other two), replacing her great-grandmother following her suicide.

Viktoria and Evie

And this I really liked – it was a neat thing to do with the three brides trope. Walt, has a pact with three families. The Alexanders – who deal with his real estate and who had not produced a female family member for some time, so finding Evie was a relief. Viktoria is a Klopstock, who are bankers mentioned within the Dracula text, and Lucy is a Billington, one of the solicitor firms Dracula uses in the novel. There is some underlying lore around their eternal lives relying on there being three – that wasn’t explained in detail unfortunately but the idea that Dracula drew the three from specific bloodlines was brilliant. It should be noted that the Alexanders are not from the novel. As for Walt he states that he has been called strigoï and nosferatu and then mentions being the Son of the Dragon, which is where Evie nearly says the D word.

turning to dust on staking

Killing vampires in this is strictly stake, fire and decapitation. There are some minor issues and one comes out in staking where we see a double impalement but the staking is clearly through the stomach for both vampires – indeed, it is one of the worst examples of clearly missing the heart I’ve seen – a shame given the fact that otherwise it was quite a cool staking. Likewise, there is some in-film logical use of names from the novel (the family names, New Carfax etc) then naming a pair of characters Jonathan (Jeremy Wheeler, the Munsters) and Mina Harker (Elizabeth Counsell) was an unfortunate grab at novel connection which was unnecessary and seemed to be for a ham-fisted broadcast of a plot development only.

the monster revealed

The film looks great and there is some nice ‘haunting’ moments put in. Evie works as the protagonist with vulnerabilities but an underlying strength she has to tap into and Nathalie Emmanuel is very natural in the role. There does seem to be a chemistry with Thomas Doherty’s very charming Walt – though he perhaps was less sinister than he should be when the mask was removed. Sean Pertwee was wonderfully surly as the butler. I think what I liked most about this was the neat way of dealing with the brides, however. 7.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK