The Invite – Review

Cert – 15, Run-time – 1 hour 47 minutes, Director – Olivia Wilde

Joe (Seth Rogen) and Angela’s (Olivia Wilde) marriage has long been full of arguments, when their upstairs neighbours (Penélope Cruz, Edward Norton) come for a dinner party revelations and confrontations make for an awkward and heated night.

The Invite makes me believe that Olivia Wilde could make a film in an Ikea display room and still have it feel cinematic. Confined to an, admittedly quite large, apartment – having been made from two initially connected flats – and focusing on just four characters at no point does this feel as if we’re watching a filmed play. Multiple corners are shown through the open-plan spaces, corridors, doorways and other areas of the home, there feels nowhere to properly hide or gain privacy or escape from the various conversations unfolding. Even when not sharing a space it feels like the four characters are talking over each other.

The camera placement and blocking feel so specific yet natural that they carry the rising tensions and awkwardness of the not-quite-dinner-party at hand. Angela (Wilde) has spent the day preparing meats, cheeses, a soufflé and new rug for a dinner party with upstairs neighbours Hawk (Edward Norton) and Piña (Penélope Cruz) to get to know them and apologise for the recent renovation noise. Husband Joe (Seth Rogen – once again showing great dramatic chops, I continue to point to his excellent turn in 2015’s Steve Jobs) has completely forgotten and is not ready to meet the couple he’s been annoyed by so many times in the lift.

Bickering flows from almost the second the two are in the apartment together. Thick and fast the agitation rises and rises between them with biting remarks beyond two people who are simply tried after a long day. Building us to prepare for awkwardness and a night of rifts the laughs start early on and only grow as Hawk and Piña arrive. The couples contrast and the guise of the perfect (at least as can be) dinner party is rife with fractures from the off. Awkwardness and a desperate need to escape almost any topic of conversation are the core offerings, and both provide plenty of laughs amongst the excruciating exercise of failing politeness between the central couple as they try to engage with their guests – who have some surprising revelations of their own to throw a spanner into the works around halfway through.

It’s this spanner which somewhat changes the humour to a new kind of awkwardness – wonderfully charted by the cast, particularly Rogen and Wilde on excellent form, particularly the latter’s glaring looks and facial expressions which conjure many laughs. The conversation sits uncertainly and uneasily, with no clear route to follow as we see it play out in real time and quietly explore Joe and Angela’s relationship.

More dramatic beats emerging in the second half are also effectively handled and bring a sense of reflective poignancy, especially in the very final stages. Slotting in with relative ease amongst the frequently, unexpectedly so, funny surroundings of Rashida Jones and Will McCormack’s script. Helped by the editing which maintains the layered flow with rhythms matching the opening credits where multiple shots play out alongside each other as Joe’s bike-struggle home contrasts with Angela’s day of buying decorations and ingredients. It’s the first flavour of a 70s feel to this contemporary adult drama. A feeling further found in the general set-up, and some of the look of the feature, too. One that seems to have been specifically thought about in capturing some of the film’s style.

I’m sure that returning to this film will bring out more, new awkwardness in the overlapping lines of dialogue that I didn’t hear over others on a number of occasions – creating an intentional layer of chaos and natural uneasiness for the characters, and further humour for the audience. Keenly conjured and captured by Wilde’s direction, and the excellent performances which allow the screenplay’s fracturing dinner party to break in truly entertaining fashion.

Excruciatingly entertaining, The Invite is an adult drama with a 70s feel. Brilliantly performed and written there’s a natural awkwardness flowing throughout, bringing plenty of laughs as the sharp drama quietly grows within it.