The Invite movie review: Olivia Wilde’s sex comedy is best experienced with a crowd
This is not one for under-the-covers. The Invite, with Olivia Wilde and Penelope Cruz, should be seen with the largest crowd you can find.
There’s a reason the 2020 Spanish movie The People Upstairs has been remade in Switzerland, France, South Korea and now the US, retitled The Invite.
The premise and the production is seductively simple — it features only four characters, largely one location and a timeline that’s contained within one evening. If you pull it off, you weaponise the structure as a claustrophobic tension builder, as we’ve seen before with the likes of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and Carnage.
The Invite works on that set-up with two couples under stress, with secrets spilling out between and cross each other, which is something we never tire of. Everyone wants to know what’s going on in someone else’s relationship, it’s what fuels the gossip machine.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.The Invite is directed by Olivia Wilde, her third time in the chair after the excellent teen comedy Booksmart and the uneven Don’t Worry Darling, and this very funny sex comedy is a far more cohesive effort than her previous film, a return to form, if you will.
Wilde also plays one of the four characters, Angela, who’s married to Joe (Seth Rogen). Angela doesn’t work but pours all her energies into renovating and redecorating their San Francisco apartment, which, admittedly, is perfectly curated and yet still lived in.
But are her intense pre-occupations with rugs and paint colours (the swatches on the bedroom wall are basically three near-identical shades of duck egg) just distracting from her strained marriage to Joe?
Joe is a former musician who now teaches at a prestigious school but the piano in his office sits unplayed, as does the records of his previous work, a sign of the unresolved issues he has with his failed artistic ambitions.
The two bicker over almost everything, and especially about the fact Angela has invited their upstairs neighbours, Pina (Penelope Cruz) and Hawk (Edward Norton), to dinner that very night.
It’s the last thing Joe wants, still resentful over the loud sex noises emanating from above them at all hours of the night. That’s a pretty awkward thing to bring up, but Joe is determined, despite Angela’s vehement objections.
Pina and Hawk show up, full of suave confidence and natural sexuality with a seemingly perfect relationship. They seem the opposite of Joe and Angela but, eventually, they’ll discover some commonalities.
The Invite is very enjoyable and reliable hilarious because it got its key elements correct — a cracker script by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack (who previously wrote Celeste and Jesse Forever together), excellent casting, good blocking to make the most of its set, and assured direction.
Wilde brings out great performances from her ensemble (and herself) — her Angela is a ball of anxiety laced with sadness, Rogen is spiky and bitter, Hawk is smug superiority and Cruz is pure charisma and playfulness.
Despite everyone’s neuroses, but especially Angela and Joe, they’re all still weirdly likeable, which likely has something to do with the goodwill each of the actors bring to the table from being generally a great screen presence.
The characters bounce well off each other in their various pairings and also as a group as they move from room-to-room in this limited space, it’s that chemistry which underpins the success of this film.
When things get saucier — or attempts are made at sexcapades — it’s the foundation of those earlier scenes that make the later shenanigans shine.
Relationships are tough, and our expectations of them — and of ourselves in them — are even tougher, and The Invite starts to get into all the nuances of these four characters and their hang-ups.
If there are quibbles, it’s that The Invite is a touch too long, both overall and in most of its scenes (the pacing could’ve been faster, particularly at the beginning), and the denouement maybe tips its hat too much.
Still, it’s such an enjoyable experience as it elicits great cackling guffaws and awkward ye-gods teehees. So much fun, and best experienced with a crowd.
Rating: 4/5
The Invite is in cinemas on July 9
