Olivia Wilde's third film as director is back to the high quality of her memorable debut, Booksmart, and while The Invite is equally as funny, it also has a fresh level of maturity. In a time when most movies shy away from sex, this one discusses it with profound honesty and a welcome messiness. It's based on both a Spanish play and a Spanish movie (written by Cesc Gay), but it effortlessly becomes its own thing. I've seen it twice, and I believe it will be one of the year's best films.
Wilde stars with Seth Rogen as San Francisco couple Angela and Joe, living in a huge apartment inherited from Joe's parents. Joe is a once-promising musician whose 1990s band had a modest radio hit. Now he teaches music students at a second-rate Berkeley school. Angela spends time fussing over the apartment, decorating, and stressing over little details. Their marriage is, to say the least, struggling.
She has invited a couple upstairs for the evening. Joe has nothing but disdain for the couple, for their awkward elevator rides and their noisy sex sessions. They arrive just as Angela and Joe's arguing has reached a furious fever pitch. They are Pina (Penélope Cruz) and Hawk (Edward Norton), who ooze contentment and confidence. They can clearly see through the flimsy facade constructed by Angela. Joe does not hide his scorn, and Hawk appreciates that honesty.
Everything goes instantly wrong. Joe didn't pick up any wine, so they are forced to open a special, aged, celebratory wine instead. Pina cannot eat any of the vast meat-and-cheese spread Angela has spent hours constructing. Joe is determined to complain about the noisy sex, but Angela tries to shut him up. Things loosen up after some alcohol is consumed and some pot is smoked, and after Hawk and Angela and Joe and Pina split off. Then comes the kicker. Pina and Hawk have come with a proposal.
All four of these characters are dimensional and fully-realized. They are all hiding things. They all want things. They are all wounded in some way. Their interactions, whether truth or deception, are exquisitely balanced, each playing off of the other as if in a perfect harmony, or a symphony. All four performances are expert. Penélope Cruz is an Oscar winner and Edward Norton is a four-time Oscar nominee, but Olivia Wilde and Seth Rogen, who are not, easily match them. They bring out the greatness in each other. (It would make me happy to see all of them land in each of the four Oscar acting categories next year.)
Wilde's direction is likewise inspired, masterfully using the spaces in the apartment to underscore the emotions of the scene. Moldings, doorways, windows, countertops, rugs, and everything else is used to frame and mask and block and reveal characters. It's kinetic. It's constantly moving, even if the characters are doing nothing other than sitting and talking. Devonté Hynes's high-anxiety music score, string-based, like Psycho, acts as icing on the cake. Piano music comes in as a relief.
The end result is that we feel as if the characters have been torn apart and rebuilt, like malfunctioning engines. It's a painful process, but healing. They have really been through the wringer. When Angela says "I'm exhausted" near the end, there's no more truthful line reading. But then there's the final scene, wordless, tying into the opening credits, which feature an audio recording, but no visuals. It's not a black-and-white conclusion, but it offers a little hope, and the notion that there might be hope for us all.
