The Invitation
For Will, the invitation is an unexpected sideswipe, his ex-wife Eden and her new husband David emerging from their self-imposed exile to gather friends they have not seen for the two years when they have been incognito in Mexico, a difficult meeting in any circumstance but one particularly troubling and traumatic for Will, returning to the house where he and Eden once lived together, the garden where their young son died, the bathroom where he physically restrained Eden to stop her killing herself in the aftermath.
His apprehension not helped by their car colliding with a coyote as he and his girlfriend Kira wend their way through the Hollywood Hills, the embraces from Eden and David as they are welcomed inside may be intended to set them at ease but the uncomfortable overfamiliarity is perhaps too effusive, Will already on edge and increasingly unsettled as their hosts and the two guests at the soiree unknown to him, Sadie and Pruitt, share the reason for their collective contentment.
Directed by Jennifer’s Body‘s Karyn Kusama from a script by R.I.P.D.‘s Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi, The Invitation sees Will (Prometheus’ Logan Marshall-Green) trying to maintain physical and emotional distance from Eden (Tammy Blanchard), apparent serene and blossoming in her new life while he looks every inch the tired and underpaid university liberal arts lecturer, but with Will feeling her behaviour is inappropriate, in turns flirting then fishing, it is but a prelude to a recruitment pitch for the community to which she and David belong which Will sees as a cult.
Will caught in a discontinuity and aware that high emotions may not run true, that his ability to assess the situation calmly may be compromised, Kira (Emayatzy Corinealdi) is more sanguine while Tommy (Mike Doyle) just wants to enjoy the expensive wine, the sense that they should be safe in suburbia in civilised company tainted by the awareness that bad things can and do happen even in the nicest neighbourhoods, the strangeness amplifying as Sadie propositions Will and Eden targets Ben (Jay Larson) whose unhappy marriage marks him as weakest of the herd.
An evening of uncomfortable social pressure, is Will overreacting to the situation, put out that his ex-wife seems happier than he finds able to be, and even if her state of mind is being influenced by those around her, Pruitt (Carnivàle‘s John Carroll Lynch) seeming to hold undue sway over both her and Sadie (Lindsay Burdge), an obviously damaged and fragile woman unable to respect the boundaries of others, does he have the right to spoil what respite Eden has found from her pain and grief just because he has found no such peace?
Taking place in the shadowed labyrinth of the increasingly sinister house as the creeping unease congeals into dread, the gathering divided over the presentation made by David (Game of Thrones’ Michiel Huisman) and the invitation which follows regardless of the stated shock of some of those present, like The Last Supper the gathering of supposed friends serves not only dinner but a purpose, like the mysteries of the similarly paced Sound of My Voice the shape of that purpose and whether it will be a threat or merely well-intentioned but unwanted remains obscured.
The Invitation will be streaming on the Arrow platform from Friday 14th February
