Vampire Flicks: The Invitation (2022)

Cody Leach is someone whom I've mentioned many times on here before. Ever since his channel got really big back around 2017, he's become a YouTuber whom I really enjoy, as I love his very down-to-Earth, off-the-cuff reviewing style. And while our opinions don't often match up, there are still a number of things that we do agree upon, especially when it comes to the horror genre. I'm starting this post out this way because, while I could be wrong, I think this may be the first thing I've ever reviewed that I first learned about from him. Since being a YouTuber who specializes in movie reviews is his job, he's much more up on what's going on in the film world or what's coming out than I am, and also goes to theaters infinitely more than I do. Case in point, I'd never heard of The Invitation before his review of it dropped in August of 2022... and from what Cody said, it sounded like I wasn't missing much. One of his favorite subgenres is vampire movies and, at that point, he, like me, was still waiting for them to finally shake off the stink of Twilight and get back to what they're meant to be. But The Invitation did not scratch that itch for him at all, as he found it to be drawn out and boring, taking forever to finally get to what everyone wanted to see, and when it finally did, the payoff wasn't worth it all. In the end, he gave it a "SKIP IT," the next-to-lowest score on his personal rating system. Because of that, this wasn't something that was very high on my pecking order, and I only thought about it when I was putting this year's list of reviews together. As my list was in continuous flux, with movies being added and then removed for various reasons, I eventually decided to put The Invitation on there simply to fill a slot. Mind you, I was not looking forward to watching it, and when I finally got around to it, I braced myself for something that was going to be hard to sit through.

But, I have to say, I found this to be a pretty enjoyable film. As Cody himself said, the story is basically Get Out, but with English nobility and vampires, so it's not the most original concept. Also, if you're at all genre-savvy, you can see where things are going early on, and, yes, the third act climax is quite predictable and not unlike anything we've seen before. But, for what it is, I think The Invitation works well. Nathalie Emmanuel makes for a likable protagonist, the film is very well shot, is absolutely dripping in the Gothic, thanks to its main setting, with some great moments of atmosphere, and while it does wait until the very end of the second act to finally show its hand, I was never bored and there are some genuinely creepy scenes leading up to it. I also like how it drops hints as to the main vampire's real identity throughout, some more obvious than others, and while the climax, again, isn't great, I found it pretty satisfying. If I had to note where they went wrong, one would be in making the movie PG-13 and dulling the bite that a vampire movie requires. That said, the unrated version on home video does make up for that a little bit. But my biggest qualm is that, as we've seen several times already this month, the specifics of the vampire's ultimate goal are really hard to get straight and even sometimes feel contradictory.

In a large manor in the English countryside, an imprisoned woman escapes the room she's locked in when someone looks in on her. With the entire household soon searching for her, she hangs herself in the foyer with a piano wire, declaring, "It all ends here, with me." Some time later, in New York, aspiring artist Evelyn Jackson, or Evie, works in the catering department for "Find Yourself," a corporation that specializes in tracing one's ancestry through DNA. With her life not going the way she hoped, and feeling lost and alone due to the death of her mother from cancer six months earlier, she decides to take one of the company's DNA tests and mail her sample. She soon gets an e-mail from Oliver Alexander, a distant second-cousin from England. As he's in New York on business, he asks if she wants to meet up and Evie agrees. When she meets him at a restaurant, Oliver asks her to tell him everything there is to know about her, and he, in turn, tells Evie that her lineage traces back to a family scandal, when her great-grandmother, Emmaline, had an affair with a black footman. The resulting child, Evie's grandfather, was raised by the footman on his own. Oliver also tells her that the entire Alexander family is overjoyed to know she exists, and invites her to an upcoming family wedding in Whitby. Initially reluctant, she ultimately agrees and flies to England. Upon arriving, Oliver drives her to New Carfax Abbey, a large, stately mansion in the English countryside. There, while she doesn't make the best first impression on the uptight, demanding head butler, Mr. Field, she is taken with the young, handsome lord, Walter De Ville. During her stay at the manor, Evie finds herself treated like virtual royalty, which she's not exactly used to, but also experiences some strange and even unnerving encounters at night. And when she meets the two maids of honor, Viktoria Klopstock and Lucy Billington, she finds the latter warm and welcoming, but the other condescending and judgemental. But, on the whole, she's touched at how she's welcomed into the family, and she and Walter become lovers. Unbeknownst to Evie, the Alexanders and the other families who've gathered there are all hiding a dark secret, one which is she meant to be play a major part in maintaining.

The Invitation was the idea of Blair Butler, who's mostly known for working as a stand-up comic, having appeared on Comedy Central's Premium Blend, as well as a writer/host on some of G4's most well-known shows, including X-Play and Attack of the Show!. She also later worked as a producer on AMC's Talking Dead. She both pitched the original idea for this film, before it was given a title (it was first called The Bride), and, when it was pushed into production, was hired to write the screenplay. This actually wasn't the first time she'd dabbled in the horror genre, as she'd been involved in writing both 2018's Hell Fest and 2019's Polaroid, and has since been involved in writing the film adaptation of the video game, Until Dawn. Initially, Sam Raimi and Robert Tapert were meant to be involved as producers, but they ultimately left the movie. 

The movie's director was Australian-born Jessica M. Thompson, who worked as both an editor and director in Sydney on some short films before she moved to New York in 2010. After making several more shorts over here, she made her feature directorial debut with 2017's The Light of the Moon, which she not only wrote and directed, but also produced and edited. Shortly afterward, Thompson moved to Los Angeles, and acted as the main director on Showtime's The End, directing six of the overall ten episodes. The Invitation marked only her second feature as director, and other than some uncredited revisions on the screenplay, she wasn't nearly as involved with it as she had been on her short films and The Light of the Moon. It proved to be fairly successful, making $38 million on a budget of $10 million, and was also quite popular when it came to Netflix, as it was part of a deal between them and Sony.

I've never had an interest in Game of Thrones or the Fast and the Furious movies, so I was unfamiliar with Nathalie Emmanuel before I saw this. However, this proved why she's already had a pretty good career, as she's great in this. As Evie Alexander, she's a struggling artist trying to make ends meet while working in New York as a caterer for "Find Yourself." There, when she's not being berated by her boss, Tony, she, as well as her friend and coworker, Grace, find themselves being sexually harassed while acting as waitresses at a company function. Between all this and both of her parents being gone, as she lost her father at fourteen and her mother died of cancer six months earlier, Evie is feeling both lost and alone. She even sometimes listens to one of her mother's last messages to her, where she assured her that she's stronger than she knows, for comfort. This prompts her to take one of her company's DNA tests, which was in a goody bag she got from the function. To her surprise, she finds that she has a second cousin, Oliver, in England, and when he asks if she wants to meet up with him for lunch, she accepts. There, Evie learns about her past, namely that her lineage goes back to a scandal that rocked the Alexander family back in the 1920's. But Oliver also assures her that, despite attitudes at the time, her extended family is now very happy to learn about her, and he invites her to come to a family wedding in Whitby to meet them. Initially, Evie is unsure, even when Oliver says that he and the family will pay for her flight, but when he tells her that this means she still has family in the world, she agrees to the trip. Upon arriving in Whitby and being driven to the site of the wedding, New Carfax Abbey, the home of the De Ville family, Evie is floored at the size of the place. However, no sooner does she get there than she bumps into a pair of maids, causing them to drop a container filled with wine glasses. When they're subsequently chewed out and berated by the head butler, Mr. Field, Evie stands up for them and herself. She also doesn't have the best first interaction with the lord of the manor, Walter De Ville, making things rather awkward, at least for the moment.

Despite the house's enormous size and her being waited on, which she's not used to, Evie does begin to enjoy her time at the Abbey. Despite their not so great first meeting, she does admit to finding Walter quite attractive, and when he goes out of his way to again apologize for Field's behavior, it smooths things over a bit. She's also very touched when she's introduced to the extended family and they warmly welcome her. And, during a reception one night, she and Walter sneak off together and, after getting to know each

other better, admit their mutual attraction. However, not all is well, as some really strange and eerie things happen to Evie at night: strange dreams, the feeling that she's being watched when she walks out onto the second floor stairway landing, and, creepiest of all, she wakes up one night and finds a ghostly, seemingly inhuman, figure in her room, which disappears when Walter comes in to check on her. On a more down-to-Earth level, when she meets the maids of honor, Lucy and Viktoria, she finds the former friendly and

welcoming, but the latter sarcastic, condescending, and downright antagonistic towards her. Things come to a head when, while they're down in the spa, Viktoria talks about Evie and Walter's growing relationship, and suggests that Walter may be hiding something sinister about his past. Evie swings around and confronts her about her attitude, causing the woman doing her manicure to cut her finger. Viktoria, in turn, walks naked out of the heated pool she's been wading in, and sucks the blood off her finger. Thoroughly freaked out by this, Evie storms out and,

when she's back in the foyer, becomes curious about the library, which she's been told is undergoing renovations. When she enters it, she finds, on Walter's desk, extensive research into her background, including where she went to school, and whether or not she has a criminal record. Feeling like Walter was stalking her before he even actually met her, she's about to leave, until he tells her that he was only trying to make sure she wasn't an opportunist who planned to take advantage of him because of his wealth. This allows them to reconcile and then, they end up having sex.

As they're lying in bed afterward, Walter "jokes" to Evie that they should have a double wedding, which she laughs at but sarcastically accepts. But that night, at the rehearsal dinner, Walter suddenly announces that the two of them will soon be wed. Then, in the midst of Evie's objections, Mr. Field slits a maid's throat, drains the blood into a punch bowl, and serves it to Walter, Viktoria, and Lucy, revealing that the three of them are vampires, and the two are Walter's brides. This shocks Evie to her core, and while she

feebly tries to escape, she's promptly imprisoned in the cellar. Throughout all of this, she gradually learns that she is to replace her great-grandmother, Emmaline, who committed suicide when she could no longer stand her cursed existence as one of Walter's three brides, as well as over the guilt of drinking human blood. And while Evie is given another chance to escape afterward, she doesn't get far and ends up back at the Abbey, where the wedding ceremony is set to begin. In the end, she has to take advantage of what she will gain from Walter's union in order to finally obtain her freedom, as well as destroy him and the pact he's managed to keep up for centuries.

Honestly, even if you go into this movie unaware of where it eventually leads, you know that there's something not quite right about Walter De Ville (Thomas Doherty) from the moment he's introduced. Though he takes Evie's frustration over Mr. Field's attitude in stride, while also lightly dishing some snark back to her, the way he carries himself, with this confident, soft-spoken, intentionally charming demeanor, makes him come off as someone who can't be trusted. That's especially true when he shows up at her bedroom that night to apologize further, and after a bit of banter, he tells her, "I'm glad you decided to make the trip over. I'm looking forward to getting to know you better." And then, at the reception out on the grounds one night, he swoops in and has Evie dance with him in front of everybody, before suggesting that they go off by themselves. He takes her to a private little art studio, where they reveal more about themselves, as Evie talks about her love for ceramics, thanks to her mother, while Walter tells her that his own parents are also dead and have been for a long time. Eventually, Evie jokingly tells him to stop putting on this front of a, "Mysterious, self-deprecating, 'Oh, I can't help it. I have so much money,' bad guy," but he still keeps it up for a little bit, just to amuse her, before they kiss for the first time. Late that night, after Evie has been frightened by a creepy figure showing up in her room, which disappears when Walter comes in to check on her, he offers to stay with her until she falls asleep. They talk for a bit, and this is where it feels like Walter is actually being honest for the first time. He asks Evie what she wants out of life, and after she answers that she just wants to live it to its fullest, he, in turn, says that, while he knows he lives an enviable existence, "Having all the money in the world means nothing." He recognizes that statement as a cliche, but adds, "I just... want someone to share all this with, to enjoy it with. I'm tired of the facade, constantly keeping up appearances. Yes, it's a grand life, but... it's isolating. I want someone to see me for who I truly am, instead of trying to change me into an idea or a concept. An itch that they need to scratch."

The first real cracks come when, influenced by Viktoria suggesting that Walter has some skeletons in the closet, Evie sneaks into the library and finds a lot of intimate research material about her on his desk. When confronted with this, Walter explains that he asked Oliver to look up that information to make sure she was trustworthy, rather than a greedy opportunist. He adds, "I do want to get to know you. The real you, not some bullet points on a piece of paper. And, yes, I would be lying if I said I wasn't intrigued by what I

saw. I am guilty of that." Fair enough reason, though Evie says he could've just asked her, which he says he should have, but adds he's simply not use to having this kind of relationship with someone. He also says that the thought of her leaving frightened him, then says, "Please, don't run away." That leads to them having sex after she says, "No more secrets." Then, as they're lying there in the afterglow, Walter suggests they have a double wedding, saying, "I mean, our families are here, all the arrangements have been made... We should live in the moment, throw caution

to the wind." Evie sarcastically answers, "Okay, fine. I accept," and though she then makes it clear that she was just joking, his reaction seems to suggest he isn't. And that night, at the rehearsal dinner, he proves it when he announces that he and Evie are going to be married, before he, Viktoria, and Lucy reveal that they're vampires. He then makes a declaration about the pact that the three visiting families have had with him for generations, consisting of each of them supplying him with a bride in exchange for him providing them with wealth and protection, and that Evie is to fill the void that Emmaline left when she committed suicide.

Once he no longer has to put up a front, Walter proves to be rather monstrous, and Thomas Doherty seems to relish finally getting to play evil, as he has some nice lines and moments. He tells Evie, "You have brought new life to these four walls. Maybe even enough to make this old heart beat again," and when she begs to be allowed to leave and go home, he coldly tells her, "This is your home. We are your family." He then comes off as downright irritated and fed up with her, as he reminds her of how they talked about being

done with the charade and keeping secrets. And when none of the families make a move to help her, prompting her to call them "monsters" and "sick," Walter chuckles and puts on a pleasant demeanor as he tells everyone not to take what she says seriously. That's before he suddenly moves across the room in a flash, corners her against the wall, and, in a warning tone, tells her, "You're embarrassing me." He then leaves her to Viktoria and Lucy, telling them, "Tonight is yours. Tomorrow is mine." This leads to

her being imprisoned in the basement, where the other two brides let her know what's expected of her and what she herself will gain from this union. Though Evie does try to escape, she's recaptured and awakens to find herself back at the Abbey, in the library, where Walter is casually feeding on the blood of one of the maids. He tells her, "It was a gallant attempt, I'll give you that. I trust you have it out of your system now." He also then tries to make her see the benefits of wedding him and becoming a vampire, such as wealth, power, eternal life, and a sense of belonging, 

among others. He also condescendingly, and racially, adds, "For someone of your... 'background,' surely this is more than a leg up," prompting her to literally spit in his face... and he grabs her hands and uses it to wipe it off. He finally says that she can't get out of this arrangement, as she "agreed," referring to when she said yes to his idea of a double wedding. She says that he tricked into it, but he answers, "Fortunately for me, the fine print is irrelevant." He then proceeds to drink the maid's blood from her leg, commenting that he's always found the fibula to be "underrated." This causes Evie to pass out again.

It's also in that latter scene that Walter makes a significant revelation when Evie asks who he is: "In the old country, they called my kind 'strigoi' or 'Nosferatu.' And in Wallachia, they called me, 'Son of the Dragon.'" And if you're at all familiar with Romanian history, vampires, and a certain Bram Stoker novel, you know that the medieval Romanian name for that title is Dracula. They stop short of flat-out saying it, likely figuring those in the know would get it, but yeah, this is actually a Dracula movie. In

fact, throughout it, there have been hints as to Walter's actual identity: the story is set in Whitby, where Dracula arrived in England onboard the Demeter, the main setting is called "New Carfax Abbey," after the old, rundown house he purchased in the original Bram Stoker story, and one of Walter's brides is named Lucy. Also, Walter is able to walk around in the daytime, as are Lucy and Viktoria, which, again, is how it is in the original Stoker novel. His last name, De Ville, all but says "devil," which translates to

"Dracul" in modern Romanian. Moreover, his having once been called Son of the Dragon, in Wallachia, suggests that he's not only Dracula the vampire but also Vlad the Impaler, since the former is a title associated with him, and the latter is where he reigned. Most significantly, when Evie first enters the Abbey, she sees a statue of a dragon battling a knight in the foyer, only it depicts the dragon winning the battle, rather than the other way around. If we're to believe that the soldier in that statue is Saint George, the patron saint of England, then it implies that, in

this reality, not only did the events of the classic story of Dracula actually happen, but, instead of being driven back to Transylvania, he managed to prevail and establish his rule over, at least, Yorkshire. Who knows, he may have control over all of England, and it's just been kept secret from the rest of the world! And yet, his legend is still widely known enough to where Evie realizes who he is after the hints he gives her.

Unfortunately, during the climax, Walter proves to be a rather pathetic excuse for Dracula. Once Evie drinks his blood at their wedding and becomes a vampire herself (she's able to bring him to his knees by doing that), she quite easily manages to defeat him. First, she stakes him in the chest and leaves him there in the chapel, which she sets ablaze, in Viktoria and Lucy's arms. It turns out she didn't stab him deep enough, though, as he shows up again after she's dealt with everyone else. Confronting her in the foyer, he grabs

her by the throat, lifts her up, and tells her how he would've given her everything she could've ever wanted. And when she responds by telling him that he's a monster, he proves to be a total megalomaniac and shouts, "I AM A GOD!" However, she then easily slices his right hand off, and kills him by kicking him into the fire that's spread from the cathedral.

Evie first meets Viktoria (Stephanie Corneliussen) and Lucy (Alana Boden) at the reception the night before the rehearsal dinner, where they're introduced as the maids of honor. From the get-go, Lucy is very polite and welcoming towards Evie, while Viktoria comes off as snarky and condescending. One of the first things she says to Evie is, "You're American. I was expecting something else," and she also tells Lucy to, "Stop trying so hard," when she's gushing about her. Viktoria also touches one of Evie's locks in

a manner she doesn't care for, then sneeringly tells her, "Your life in New York, it sounds, um, terribly humdrum. How fortunate that your cousin plucked you out of thin air and brought you here, to us." This dynamic continues as the party goes on, with Lucy talking to Evie about how much she's always wanted to visit New York, while Viktoria later looks on with disdain as Walter and Evie dance, and makes more remarks about his infatuation with her afterward. 

Things get even more serious the next morning, when Viktoria and Lucy take Evie down to the mansion's spa. As Evie and Lucy are getting a manicure, Viktoria swims around in the heated pool, and while the other two make what seems, initially, like simple girl-talk regarding their families and marriage prospects, Viktoria suddenly snarks at Lucy, "Oh, do leave the poor girl alone, Lucy. You're like a little Pomeranian. Yap, yap." She then inquires about Evie and Walter's growing relationship, as she earlier made

a remark about her having had, "Quite a night." When Evie insists they're just getting to know each other, Viktoria doesn't buy it, and then asks her how much she really knows about Walter, as well as how much he's told her about the two of them. Evie says, "I think you should take people as they are, you know? People change. No point digging up skeletons," to which Viktoria chuckles snidely and says, "I call bullshit. Nobody has that much virtue. Given the opportunity, we'd all snoop. Read their diaries, texts, e-mails. Can't help it. It's in our nature." When she keeps pushing,

Evie turns around and confronts her, causing the woman giving her a manicure to cut her finger. Viktoria responds by walking out of the pool and sucking the blood right off her finger, disturbing Evie enough to send her out of the room. As she does, Viktoria calls after her, "Just teasing you, baby doll. Lighten up. You'll learn to love me. Promise."

That night, at the rehearsal dinner, Viktoria and Lucy are revealed to be vampires along with Walter, as well as brides provided to him by their respective families. And when Evie is imprisoned within the basement, they visit her. Once again, while Lucy is more sympathetic and tries to assuage Evie's fears, saying they will soon be like sisters, which they both said they wanted, Viktoria complains about how "difficult" she's being, saying Emmaline wasn't like this, before her sense of morality put them all in danger.

Specifically, she notes how she grew to refuse to feed on the staff, which reveals that she and Lucy are the ones who have been sporadically attacking and killing the maids lately. Viktoria also admits that she was the apparition who appeared in Evie's bedroom the other night, saying she was in, "A playful mood." Lucy, meanwhile, comes off like someone who's been brainwashed, saying that she, Viktoria, and Evie will be, "Three perfect little dolls for the master," and that Emmaline, "Became confused." She goes on to explain why Walter needs three brides and how the

combination of their bloodlines gives them their power, as well as that she and Viktoria came from similar human existences to Evie, where they didn't have that many opportunities. In fact, she says it was even worse for them, given the time periods they originate from, with Viktoria having been a vampire for 500 years and Lucy 100. Finally, she assures Evie that she will be thankful when she's bonded to Walter and receives his power, while Viktoria is compelled to seal her in a coffin until then, as well as prepare one of the maids, Dee, for Evie to feed on after the ceremony.

At the ceremony, both of them are delighted when Evie appears to submit, willingly drinking Walter's blood and, upon becoming a vampire, seemingly going for Dee next. But when she then sets the chapel ablaze and stakes Walter, Viktoria angrily chases Evie and Dee back up to the foyer and attacks the former. During their fight, Viktoria tells Evie that all she did was wound Walter, and proceeds to pretty much dominate her, while also insulting her, calling her "pathetic" and "nothing." But then, to her shock, she

gets attacked by Lucy, who's had a change of heart and decided that enough is enough. Viktoria tells her to get back in line but Lucy also decides she's fed up with her ordering her around (during the ceremony, Viktoria had snapped at her to stop smiling), leading to a brief struggle that ends with the both of them impaled on the dragon statue . Despite this little bit of animosity, there does still appear to be some affection between them during their final moments, given how they look at each other, and how Viktoria gently touches Lucy's face, before they crumble and disintegrate into ash.

Going back to Walter for a bit, another clue to his real identity is how, like Dracula, he once had three brides, and is now seeking a new one to replace Emmaline. They even go further with it and extend it to where he actually needs three brides, each of a rare and special bloodline, in order for them to become all powerful. Rather than biting her on the neck, this pact is accomplished by having Evie drink his blood, just as he forced Mina Seward in the original novel, and then having him drink hers to seal the deal. Killing

him is also a way to cure those whom he's turned, which Evie does during the climax. Coffins do play a part in the story, but only as an intended temporary prison for Evie until the wedding ceremony, when Viktoria seals her inside one in the cellar. The reflection angle never comes up, and though the mirror in Evie's room is smashed, its significance is never explained. As for the vampires' abilities, it mainly comes down to superhuman speed, agility, and strength. They're able to climb along walls, move fast to the point where they basically teleport, and are 

also seemingly able to take on something of an ethereal nature in the darkness, as seen in the scenes where they stalk the maids and Viktoria plays around with Evie in the dark. There's no shape-shifting or hypnosis here, and as for the ways to kill a vampire, staking (in general, not just through the heart), beheading, and burning all apply, although Walter, likely due to his power, proves to be harder to kill than Viktoria or Lucy.

What I find really confusing, though, is exactly how Walter's need for three brides works. First of all, even though it does hearken back to the classic Dracula story, let's not pretend it isn't utterly contrived and an excuse to set the plot in motion. Second, Viktoria tells Evie that the combination of their bloodlines will make them and Walter, "All powerful. Immune to the effects of time," and Lucy then, "At the ceremony, you'll be bound to the master. And to us. But in order to make the bond permanent,

you must first consume his blood... But only after the master drinks your blood will we all be granted immortality." So, they're not immortal at the moment? I guess that's why Viktoria and Lucy killed the maids in the library and wine cellar, to sustain themselves, but it sounds like, without three brides, they either shouldn't be vampires anymore or should have aged rapidly and crumbled into dust. What's more, even though Evie does drink Walter's blood, he never drinks hers, but she still becomes a vampire. And, if 

Viktoria and Lucy are so far apart in how long each of them has been a vampire, and Emmaline only became bound to them in 1925, how were they able to maintain their immortality beforehand? I guess you could say Walter has had more wives than just them throughout his existence and, like Emmaline, many of them didn't like the life they now had and killed themselves. But even them, they seemed completely caught off-guard and unprepared for what Emmaline did, when, if that's happened before, you'd think they'd have some kind of fail-safe in place. About the only thing about this which makes sense is that killing Walter frees Evie from her vampirism, as we've seen that before.

The vampires' designs are very minimal and basic, with the only major changes when their true selves come out being fangs and long claws, a la Nosferatu. However, when Evie manages to stake Walter once she has his power, he becomes much, much older-looking, and his eyes an inhuman color. While the makeup design itself is nothing special, it is significant in that it's likely another call back to Stoker's Dracula, where he started out old but grew younger. Also, when Evie is first turned, black-colored veins run up along her upper torso, neck, and into her eyes, and when Viktoria and Lucy are both killed, their flesh seems to begin to crumble before they disintegrate into ash.

Sean Pertwee has a small but memorable role as New Carfax Abbey's head butler, Mr. Field, who proves to be cold and harsh towards the maids, and clearly looks down on them, as well as just about everyone else. When Evie accidentally knocks into two of them and causes them to break some glasses, Field shows up and, ignoring Evie's explanation, orders the maids to clean it up. When Evie, again, says it was her fault, he just snaps, "I don't care whose fault it was," then tells the maids, "Just get rid of it." Evie proceeds to call him out on his attitude, saying, "There's no need to be snarky about it," and when he says, "I beg your pardon?", she comes back with, "Did I stutter?" Once Walter appears and tells Field that she's one of the "important guests" they're expecting, he changes his tune, which only offends Evie more, since that shouldn't denote the amount of respect earned. Later, Field is tasked with showing Evie to her room, and tells her that she has free reign of the house, except the library, which is being "renovated." That night, he proves to be genuinely sinister, sending a maid into the library to clean it by herself, which leads to her death. The next day, he does the same thing, sending two maids down into the wine cellar to fetch a certain brand. When one questions why it's necessary for two of them to do it, Field tells her, "You have a propensity to break things." This, again, leads to their deaths, and both times, Field can be heard whispering in some other type of language, possibly Romanian, as it happens. He really proves his devotion to Walter during the third act, when he personally slits the one maid's throat at the rehearsal dinner and pours it into a punch bowel before serving it to him, Viktoria, and Lucy. And when Evie manages to temporarily escape, Field, after stalking her with a meat cleaver (which he used to kill Mrs. Swift for helping Evie), organizes a search of the property. At one point, when she just manages to elude him, locking him in the ice house, he angrily bangs on the door and shouts at her, "We will hunt you down!"

After she's become a vampire, Evie has a final confrontation with Field following Viktoria and Lucy's deaths. He attacks her with a spear, and when he has her cornered, reveals just how much he personally despises her. As he tries to drive the spear's tip through her, he sneers, "I told Master that you were subpar the moment he mentioned you. That you were so... beneath... our state! I should have slit that baby's throat, your grandfather, when I had the chance. I am going to enjoy cutting your head off, and

feeding it to the fucking wolves!" Though he comes close to staking her, Evie quickly manages to break the blade off and stab Field in the throat with it. Although he himself doesn't seem to be a vampire, Field is clearly either undead or immortal, as what he said about Evie's grandfather makes him easily over a hundred years. As it turns out, he's another character from the classic Dracula story: Renfield, which he's billed as in the ending credits.

Rather than being supernatural in some way, Evie's cousin, Oliver Alexander (Hugh Skinner), is just a rat. Significantly, he's the one who finds her thanks to her DNA ancestry test and meets her in New York. Acting very accommodating and happy to know her, he asks her to go into everything about her, from her current employment and if she's seeing anybody, to her parents' current whereabouts; in retrospect, you realize that, even though he's researched everything there is to know about her, he's making doubly sure that nobody will miss her when she doesn't return from England. Once she talks about her mother, noting that she always wanted to take her to England so they could learn about their lineage, Oliver tells her about the nearly century-old family scandal that eventually led to her birth. He also convinces her to come to Whitby for the wedding, saying the whole family is dying to meet her, and that she's no longer alone. He then personally meets her at the Whitby airport and drives her to the Abbey. As he hangs around for the wedding, he noticeably encourages the growing closeness between Evie and Walter, and has a rather suspicious conversation about her with Viktoria at the reception, where he notes Viktoria's jealousy, and she sarcastically congratulates him on finding a female member of the Alexander family. When Walter and everyone else drops the facade, and Evie's intended wedding to the former is announced, Oliver goes along with the toasting with an arrogant feel about him, and has the gall to tell Evie, "I believe congratulations are in order, dear cousin." He also proves to be a coward, as when the chapel is set on fire during the climax, and Evie glares at him, he runs for it. By the time Evie has dealt with everyone and escaped the Abbey, Oliver has fled, but the last scene shows that, if he thought he was home free, he's seriously mistaken.

The other really memorable member of the Alexander family is Great Uncle Alfred (Ian Lindsay), the current patriarch, whom Oliver tells Evie in New York is literally dying to meet her, given how old and frail he is. Requiring a cane, and also wearing an eyepatch, Alfred makes a warm, touching speech in the scene where Evie is introduced to all of them, talking about how happy they all are to have her there, and even gets emotional. However, when you rewatch the movie knowing their intentions, there's a sinister undercurrent when he tells her, "We are so blessed. It truly means more to me, to us, than you can ever know. So many... boys. We thought we were done for." In fact, Alfred is the one who walks Evie down the aisle when she is wedded to Walter in the chapel near the end, and kisses her on the cheek before handing her over to him. But he comes to regret that when she sets the place on fire using the candles on the altar.

Evie does have one ally in Mrs. Swift (Carol Ann Crawford), who is assigned to be her personal maid. While showing Evie to her room, she comes off as polite and accommodating, if a little antsy, telling her not to pull on the service bell too much when she first directs her attention to it. And when Evie notes a portrait of the former Lady of the House, unaware that it's her great-grandmother, Mrs. Swift tells her of her recent death, as well as describes her as, "A woman of great depth," indicating that the two of them were close. Later that night, when Evie wanders out of her room for a glass of water, and sees Mr. Field giving the maids their assignments for the evening down in the foyer, Mrs. Swift insists that she return to her room, saying it's not safe for her to be wandering around in the dark. Finally, when the ruse is dropped and Evie is imprisoned down in the cellar, Mrs. Swift, who was present at the "rehearsal dinner," is unable to take it anymore and frees Evie from the coffin she was locked in. She explains, "Your great-grandmother was a dear friend. She held out as long as she could for everyone's sake. But, in the end, being married to a monster was too much to bare." She also tells Evie how to kill a vampire, and to keep on going until she's managed to flee England. Evie then asks what will happen to her and she simply answers, "I'll get what I deserve." And that happens quite soon after, as when Evie hides in the ice house, Mrs. Swift's body is brought there, with Field likely being the killer.

Evie's best friend back in New York, Grace (Courtney Taylor), doesn't have much screentime before the setting switches to England, but she manages to be quite likable. Being a coworker of Evie's, Grace knows what she has to put up with, as she endures a bit of it herself. When they're talking after the party that Find Yourself puts on, Grace says, "I got a boob graze and a butt grab tonight," and when Evie, in turn, says she got a double boob grab, she comments, "Ooh, frisky." And yet, when Evie is disgusted that someone wrote their number on one of her tips, Grace says she might call them herself, saying, "Evie, don't judge. You know how hard it is out here." She also happens to snag a goody bag for Evie, which contains the DNA test that kicks off the whole thing. Grace is visiting Evie at her apartment when she checks her e-mail and finds Oliver's message. Seeing his picture, Grace says he's the whitest man she's ever seen, and when Evie considers meeting up with him, she tries to talk her out of it, commenting, "Oh, so you want to be catfished?", and adding that, for all she knows, he may want her kidneys. And when Evie says Oliver is British, adding that, "They're all absurdly polite," Grace says, "Yeah, because they're wracked with colonial guilt. It doesn't mean you can mistake that for good manners." Evie, in turn, brings up how Grace's last three boyfriends were white and she goes, "Mm-mm. We are unpacking that in therapy. Look, don't do me like that." 

Throughout her trip, Evie repeatedly talks with Grace on her cellphone, keeping her up to date about what's going on, and Grace gives her the same kind of sassy, sarcastic remarks, especially when Evie talks about Walter. That said, though, when Grace manages to get a look at Walter, as Evie is talking to her when he comes up to once again apologize for Mr. Field's behavior, she encourages Evie to go after him. The last time Evie talks with Grace is through text messages right before she goes to the spa with

Viktoria and Lucy, telling her to stop worrying about her... which isn't long before everything goes to hell. But, at the end of the movie, after she's escaped and the vampires are dead, Evie returns to England with Grace and the two of them track down Oliver in London, planning to take him down. In fact, Grace intends to beat his ass with a bat!

Immediately before the scene where Walter reveals that he's Dracula, Evie, managing to escape the Abbey and make it to the nearby town, seeks refuge in an antique shop, run by an elderly couple: in fact, they're none other than Mina (Elizabeth Counsell) and Jonathan Harker (Jeremy Wheeler). Initially, I thought that this was meant as just a nod to the original Bram Stoker story, since, if we're to believe they really are meant to be those specific characters, they would also be well over a hundred years old by 

this point. But what tips Evie off that they're in cahoots with Walter is an old picture of the two of them with much of the staff at Carfax Abbey, including someone who appears to be a younger Mr. Field. You could argue that they were gifted with immortality like Renfield, but if that's the case, they clearly didn't age as gracefully as him. In any case, though they initially appear helpful, Jonathan calls the Abbey and informs them of where Evie is, while Mina gives her a cup of tea that, naturally, is drugged. She tries to escape, throwing the hot tea into Jonathan's face and bolting for the door, but Mina whacks her over the head with a statue. Before she passes out, Mina tells her, "Don't fuck this up for all of us, my dear," another sign that Walter's reach extends far beyond the three families who've given him his brides. The Harkers are later present at Evie's intended wedding to Walter, with Jonathan sporting a big, ugly burn from where Evie hit him with the hot tea.

Though Emmaline Alexander (Virag Barany) commits suicide in the opening scene, she does still prove to have something a presence in the house. Not only is Evie apparently given her room, as suggested by the large portrait of her on the wall there, but when she goes for run on the grounds, she appears to see Emmaline watching her from her bedroom window, as her statement, "It all ends here," is repeated. There's then a brief flash of her being decapitated and Evie wakes up back in her bedroom, suggesting it was a dream. But even if it was, Emmaline's spirit seems to still be there, trying to warn Evie. But after that, it doesn't really go anywhere. 

Like Daybreakers, one of The Invitation's biggest strengths is in its visuals. The cinematography by Autumn Eakin is extremely beautiful throughout, with lots of blues, ranging from light and even greenish to very deep hues, in the many scenes set in near or complete darkness, and lush, warm gold-browns and ambers in most of the lit interiors and in some of the exteriors, such as the reception on the grounds. There are several interior scenes, such as in Evie's room, where it's near sunset and the curtains are drawn across the windows, with just a little bit of sunlight

coming through to illuminate the otherwise dim rooms, and it looks really lovely. Another visual that sticks with me, mainly because I always find stuff like this appealing, is when one of the maids goes into the kitchen following the scene where Evie meets the Alexander family and it's very dimly lit, save for shafts of brilliant, blue sunlight coming through the windows. The scene in the spa, meanwhile, is probably the most brightly lit, overtly feminine-looking one, with its very light colors, such as all of the pinks and the blue of the heated pool. Even the 

most visually mundane scenes, like the one where Evie has lunch with Oliver at the hotel, and the overcast daytime exterior when they first arrive at New Carfax Abbey, look really well. And the climax, where the Abbey is burning down around everyone, makes for a nice mixture of the movie's two prominent visual styles. Getting back to the nighttime and dark scenes, they work really well in creating an eerie mood and atmosphere, as you can sometimes just barely make out something that appears to be 

lurking in the shadows, with a good example being when Evie wakes up in the middle of the night and sees a figure standing at the foot of her bed, or when the maids are stalked in the library and down in the wine cellar. Admittedly, some of the really dark scenes are a bit too gloomy, like when Viktoria and Lucy visit Evie when she's imprisoned in the cellar, or the scene in the library where Walter admits that he's Dracula, but for the most part, it's great stuff.

Jessica Thompson's direction is also often quite inspired, with the opening scene making quite the impression, starting with the Abbey's eerie, dark foyer during a stormy night, cutting from the bottom of the stairs to the second floor landing and then to a corridor beyond it. As Mr. Field walks up to the door to Emmaline's room and unlocks it, the camera then zooms in and goes through the keyhole to reveal a classic, Gothic visual of window drapes blowing in the wind, as Emmaline stands in the back of the room. And after a short cut to a close-up of her, the camera

swings back around to the door, as Field stands there, when she suddenly appears next to him and shoves him to the side, before she runs out of her room and commits suicide. Shortly afterward, Evie's rather sad existence in New York is made clear in a montage, set to the song Floatin', where she heads home from her unenviable job in Find Yourself's catering department, to her not so great, cluttered apartment, and tries to do some pottery to clear her head, but is unable to focus and eventually gives up and throws the clay away. Naturally, we get some lovely big, wide shots of the

Whitby countryside, such as the winding road leading to the Abbey and the Abbey itself, with plenty of shots showing off its interiors. But, again, during Evie's first night there, there are some eerie,atmospheric moments, like when she's out jogging on the grounds, hears something over at the ice house across the way, then sees a vision of Emmaline watching her from the window, before she wakes up from this apparent nightmare. After that, when she walks out of her room and looks down into 

the foyer to see Mr. Field talking with the maids, you see a figure appear in the corridor she came from, then comes up behind and reach for her, only to disappear when she turns and looks. The scene later on, where Evie again awakens in her room, is just as creepy, as Evie looks over at her window, with the drapes slightly blowing in the breeze, then sees the figure standing at the foot of her bed. Before she can turn the light on, she sees that it's now on her bed's canopy, crawling along and pushing its hands into it, prompting her to hide beneath the bed. It only gets creepier from there, as I'll talk about later.

At the start of the scene down in the spa, you get the startling image of some women wearing beauty masks, who all turn to look at Evie when she's introduced. Meanwhile, the sequence afterward is nicely edited to fit the rising tension between Evie and Viktoria, constantly cutting back and forth between shots of Evie and Lucy's ongoing manicure, to close-ups of Evie and Viktoria wading in the pool, climaxing with Evie getting accidentally cut when she turns around to confront the latter. And at the rehearsal dinner, when it's revealed that Walter, Lucy, 

and Viktoria are vampires, everything becomes distorted and dream-like, as Evie tries to process what's happening when the maid's throat is slit and her blood drained. The sound, mainly that of some of the other guests laughing, becomes warped; there are sudden, quick cuts to people, some of whom are wearing bizarre masks, greedily eating some nasty-looking food; the sound of a cello being played there suddenly becomes fast and crazed; and there are moments where some of the action itself becomes 

unnaturally fast. After that, there's a quick montage where Evie puts the pieces together and realizes what her own role in this is, and when she desperately gets up and attempts to leave, they shoot her in a manner to where it feels as though she's having an out of body experience. We get more well done direction as the movie goes on, such as a blurry, lopsided shot from Evie's POV when Mina Harker knocks her out, followed by her slowly coming to, only to find herself

on a couch beside a maid whose blood Walter drinks; another shot from her POV when she finds herself in the Abbey chapel, and you gradually realize it's obscured by the wedding veil they placed on her; an effective montage during the ceremony where she decides to take control and use the power she'll gain from becoming a vampire to her advantage, and various shots of the Abbey burning down around her as she walks out, including one with colors so vibrant that they're akin to a Dario Argento film.

Despite taking place in the modern day, this is very much a Gothic horror story, thanks to the main setting of New Carfax Abbey. Isolated out in the countryside near Whitby, the Abbey is a huge, sprawling mansion, impressive both on the outside (actually Nadasdy Mansion in Hungary) and the inside. The immediate foyer is huge and imposing, adorned with pieces of artwork, notably that large dragon statue to the left of the staircase, while the top of the staircase is adorned with a suit of armor and some swords on the wall next to it, and the landing on the right has some marble

statues that, as it turns out, are those of Walter's three brides. The corridors make up something of a maze, and like much of the house, become more sinister later on, particularly at night. Evie's bedroom looks incredible, with a big, old-fashioned canopy bed, a fairly large chandelier, a portrait of Emmaline Alexander, a service bell next to the bed, and a large window with big, billowing drapes. One thing the room is missing, though, is a mirror, which Mrs. Swift claims "broke" the week before. Also, when looking at the window, Evie notes that it has bars,

which themselves have an interesting pattern of sharp spikes. Mrs. Swift explains it's to deal with shrikes, the local birds, which are quite aggressive and have a nasty habit of impaling their prey on thorns (I looked it up and that's actually true!). And there's a moment later on where a shrike slams into the window while Evie is getting ready for the reception. There's also a large drawing room (which has some instruments, such as a piano and a harp) where Evie meets the rest of the Alexander family, a dining room with a long

table where she learns the horrific truth, a small and rather primitive-looking kitchen, and a creepy, dark wine cellar, the stairs to which lie behind a gate-like door, with the same pattern as the bars on the windows. This area in the back of the house's ground floor, connected by brick-wall corridors, is where the room that Evie is imprisoned in can be found.

There are three particularly significant rooms in the Abbey. One is the spa, the centerpiece of which is the big, heated pool, along with the spot near the room's left corner where Evie and Lucy have their nails done. Another is the library, which Mr. Field claims is undergoing renovations, but it's clear they're hiding something in there, as there's a secret compartment in the wall next to the door housing a key. It's actually more of a large sitting room, with Walter's desk up against a wall adorned by some hunting trophies, a fireplace, a chair and a couch, and phonograph. This

is where the first of the maids is killed when she's sent inside to clean it, and is also where Walter tells Evie that he's actually Dracula when she's been recaptured. Finally, there's a small but very glorious-looking chapel found in the house's right wing, where Evie is forced to wed and bond herself with Walter, only for it to become an inferno when she knocks over the lit candles on the altar. As noted, the Abbey's grounds are memorably atmospheric themselves in the scene where Evie goes for a nighttime jog across 

them, as well as beautiful when they're decked out for the reception that she attends, and Walter also shows her a small but elegant and lovely art studio nearby. In stark contrast, though, is a wooden ice house on the edge of the woods, which Evie finds is where they store the bodies of the maids the vampires have fed upon. We don't see much of the town that Evie runs to upon temporarily escaping, but the antique shop that the Harkers run is as old-fashioned as the Abbey, right down to the old rotary phone they use.

If it weren't for the movie's first act set in New York (though, from what I can tell, it was all shot entirely in Hungary, mostly in Budapest), which begins in the offices and kitchen of the Find Yourself corporate headquarters, you could easily forget that this movie does take place in the year 2022. You also see the neighborhood where Evie lives, her small, cluttered apartment loft, and the fancy restaurant where she meets up with Oliver, but when she lands in England and leaves the modern-day airport, she also leaves the modern world behind, save for the short epilogue, where she and Grace track down Oliver at his real estate office in London.

Cody Leach and other reviewers have noted that The Invitation is very similar to Jordan Peele's Get Out, especially early on. While Evie isn't 100% African American like Chris was in that film, and even has some genetic links to the white family she falls prey to, it is still a story about a person of color who goes to visit a bunch of wealthy white folks who, as it turns out, have some sinister intentions for her. Ironically, while the social commentary isn't as blatant as it was in Get Out, the potential for it is even bigger, since we're talking about wealthy British families (Grace,

again, makes a comment about "colonial guilt,"), and given how Evie's lineage can be traced back to a scandalous affair between her great grandmother and a black footman in the 1920's. And, let's face it, even if those story details weren't here, it's likely that the idea of racism would constantly be in the back of your mind just from the image of an American of mixed heritage in this kind of environment. Much of the commentary comes from Evie and Grace's conversations, with Evie making that remark about Grace's last three boyfriends being white, and when

she talks to Grace after she's met her extended family, Evie comments how they're, "Very white," but then talks about them affectionately. However, along with the obvious jealousy, there's definitely an undercurrent of prejudice that Viktoria has towards Evie, with her comments about her being an American upon first meeting her. Let's also not forget what Walter says to her in the library, about her "background." And in her final confrontation with Mr. Field, his comments about how he considers her to be 

"subpar" and "beneath out state" can most definitely be construed as racial, which is to say nothing of his venomous remark about how he should've killed Evie's bi-racial grandfather as soon as he was born and how he says he's going to enjoy killing Evie herself. Because of all this, I've heard some refer to The Invitation as a "Get Out wannabe," but, I don't think I would go quite that far. Again, the story has similar details, but it doesn't make quite the same statement about it (that's not a criticism against Get Out, but just how it is).

Not surprisingly, given how it was written and directed by women, and also stars a woman, the movie also has a feminist angle to it. Fortunately, like the racial commentary, it's also not so blatant that it becomes obnoxious or distracting. The first hint of it is right at the beginning, when Evie and Grace talk about the sexual harassment they've experienced at the Find Yourself reception, something they apparently have to put up with fairly frequently. And then, their boss, Tony, who overheard them, proves he couldn't care less, as he tells them, "Want me to call

HR for you?... You know, there are plenty of other girls who'd be grateful for this gig." This becomes all the more blatant when the movie switches its setting to England, as you have the maids at New Carfax Abbey, whom Mr. Field looks down upon and bosses around, and which have been traditionally used as a food source for the vampires. And speaking of the vampires, these wealthy families providing Walter with brides puts a whole new spin on a conversation that Evie and Grace have at the beginning about how one of the guests at the reception is probably rich

enough to buy people. There's also a notion that becoming a vampire would free Evie from such social stigmas, as Lucy feels it did for her and Viktoria, since they come from time periods where women had it even harder. In the end, Evie, like Emmaline, does reject becoming a monster for whatever lifetime benefits it does afford. But she does decide to use it to free herself from being forced to marry Walter, and afterward, decides to be more self-assured and take control of her life.

That said, while I've talked about it in a joking way, I won't lie that I do find the ending to be a bit disconcerting in regards to Evie's character. While Oliver does deserve to be taken down for luring Evie in and being an accessory to the vampires' monstrous acts, and there's no way they could make the authorities believe them in order for him to be punished legally, it's still unsettling how Evie is not only fine with cold-blooded murder against another human (the master of ceremonies and other family members likely died in the fire, but it seemed like that

was an unintentional consequence of Evie's actions), but also seems like she's going to relish it, as she tells Grace to let her take the lead. And speaking of which, while I like how Grace believes Evie's story, I feel the same way about how she's willing to both go along with and participate in this, and also tells Evie that she likes this new attitude of hers. It feels like women empowerment gone overboard. 

While the film was edited down to a PG-13 when it was theatrically released, the unrated version, despite being only a minute longer, does have some more gruesome moments (as well as more nudity from Viktoria in the spa scene and a more explicit version of when Evie and Walter have sex). Most notably, in both the opening and the quick flashback to Emmaline's hanging, you see her severed head on the floor in the unrated version, and the maid at the rehearsal dinner getting her throat slashed and her blood drained is infinitely more explicit and gets 

more coverage, as do some of the nastier close-ups of the guests eating. Also, you get a more wince-inducing close-up of Walter opening his wrist in order for Evie to drink his blood; the master of ceremonies at the wedding dies a longer, more torturous death amid the flames; Field getting stabbed in the throat and dying is more intense; and, before she finishes him off for good, you see more detail in Evie's severing Walter's right arm with a piano wire. But, even with those additions, this is far from one of the goriest vampire movies ever. 

As for the visual effects, they're used minimally, mostly for the vampires' supernatural abilities, like their speed and agility, but those are fairly effective, especially in the scenes where Viktoria and Lucy are stalking their intended victims in the dark. The same also goes for the little details of when Evie becomes a vampire, like those veins that appear in her flesh, and her fangs and claws growing. However, other effects, like Viktoria and Lucy disintegrating and crumbling into dust, and the digital fire effects aren't so great, with Walter's ultimate fiery death being quite egregious, but those, thankfully, are few and far between.

The film's opening is nicely atmospheric, beginning with New Carfax Abbey on a literal dark and stormy night. Following a shot of its exterior, it cuts to inside, in the foyer, with the camera slowly going up the stairs and then towards the corridor leading away from the right side of the second floor landing. Mr. Field walks up to a door, knocks on it, and tells the person inside, Emmaline, that she must eat something. He unlocks the door, and the camera goes through the keyhole to reveal Emmaline standing

there, in the dark. She refuses to "do it anymore," and after Field opens the door and tells her that she has to, she suddenly jumps him from the side and shoves him over. She runs out the door, to the second floor landing, and, seeing some men down in the foyer, runs into a room at the opposite end of the corridor. Inside, she finds a large piano and, offscreen, rips out one of the wires and ties it around her neck. She walks back outside, down the corridor, then grabs a ceramic bust of herself and ties the other end of the wire around the railing. Bells ring all over the house, 

as all of the servants are alerted to Emmaline's escape from her room. She declares that it all ends there with her, and jumps off, hanging herself, dropping the bust and smashing it on the floor, and severing her own head from her body, which rolls across the floor, towards the camera.

Much later on, after Evie has arrived at the Abbey and gotten settled in, she goes for a jog across the grounds that night. When she stops for a rest, she hears what sounds like a creaking door over at the nearby ice house. She looks over there and, though she doesn't see anything, she does hear what sounds like voices. Turning back around, she sees Emmaline's apparent apparition watching her from her bedroom window. Suddenly, there's a quick flash to her severed head, and Evie wakes up back in her bed. Looking around,

she sees the window curtain billowing, and looks over at an old chair in the darkness. She hears what sounds like a voice calling her name, but when she switches on the lamp on the nightstand, the chair turns out to be empty, save for Evie's clothes that she left there. Seeing that it's almost 3:00 AM, she gets up and heads down the corridor leading to the foyer to get some water. When she does, she passes by the spot where Emmaline hanged herself but doesn't notice the marks on the railing. She does, however, see Field

talking to the maids down in the foyer, telling them they'll receive their instructions for the evening soon. As she stands there, watching, something reaches its hands around the edge of the doorway behind her, and then, a veiled figure walks up right behind her. It reaches a clawed hand towards her left shoulder, but when Evie, sensing something, turns around, the figure is gone. When she turns back around, she's startled to see Mrs. Swift standing in front of her. She tells her to return to her room, that it's not safe in the dark, while down below, one of the maids is

instructed to clean the library, and the others are told to go back to their rooms. As Mrs. Swift tells her they're performing final cleaning of the library, Evie sees Field open a secret compartment housing the key to it. Once he's unlocked the door and put the key back in the compartment, Evie, at Mrs. Swift's urging, goes back to her room. And after the maid has entered the library, Field closes the door behind her, then whispers to himself in another dialect.

Inside, the maid finds that main light to the dark, creepy library doesn't work, and the only illumination is from the fireplace. Regardless, she lights some candles, then proceeds to dust the room while listening to music through some earphones. Because of this, she doesn't hear the door slam hard. Then, behind her, a figure walks by the candles, extinguishing them. She does notice this, but she just lights some more, when she hears a loud creak to her right, namely from the chair behind the desk. She 

calls out, wondering if anyone's there, when the candles are all suddenly blown out again. Then, the gramophone next to the fireplace begins playing, severely creeping her out. She backs up, as the record begins skipping, and she looks up at the ceiling. There, she sees a glimpse of a figure with eyes that glow in the darkness. When it suddenly cocks its head at her, she screams, but is then attacked from the side by something else. Within an instant, the only sound is the skipping record, which a pale, clawed hand removes the needle from.

The next day, while Evie is meeting her extended family, Field sends two maids down into the wine cellar to fetch a bottle of Vino Cruor 1897. Like he did at the library the previous night, he closes the gate-like door leading to the stairs behind them and, as he walks away, twirling the key, murmurs to himself in that dialect. Down in the cellar, the two maids are first disgusted at the sight of a rat, then irritated when the already dim lights threaten to go out completely. To get around this, they light a pair of

fireplace matches and search for the particular brand of wine. As they do, one of them decides to mess with the other and grab at the bun she has in the back of her hair. Irritated at this, she tells her friend to quit messing around. They go back to searching for the wine, but the one maid, Dee, after getting creeped out by the sight of a big spider crawling around the bottles, feels something paw at her ahir again. Naturally, she thinks it's the other maid again, but when she turns around, she finds that she's nowhere

near her. In fact, there's initially no sign of her at all. But then, she calls for Dee, indicating that she found the right brand. Dee comes running and grabs the indicated bottle, but finds she can't pull it off the rack. Finding it's stuck in the back, she reaches back there to try to pry it loose, only for something to grab her hand and pull it through. As the other maid watches, a dark figure appears behind her. Dee warns her of this, and the maid turns around to see that this figure is quite taller than her. She drops both her pack of fireplace matches and the lit one she was carrying,

illuminating the figure and revealing it to be wearing a dark veil. She turns back around to Dee, who manages to pull her hand free and scrambles back along the floor. Due to the flickering lights, she gets glimpses of her friend's neck getting snapped, before her body is yanked violently back into the darkness. Utterly terrified, Dee backs up against the wall, when she feels herself grab a bare foot behind her. She looks up and screams, before a similarly creepy figure disposes of her as well.

Following the outside reception, and the developing romance between her and Walter, Evie awakens in her bedroom again late that night. She looks at the foot of her bed, seeing nothing, but then looks up at the canopy and sees it billowing. She glances over at the window to see that it's open again, with the curtain doing the same. She hears the floorboards creak and looks to see a ghostly figure standing near the foot of her bed. Scared, she reaches over for the lamp again, only to hear a voice call her name like before. She 

then looks up at the canopy and sees the impression and vague silhouette of the figure crawling across it. Able to make out that it has clawed figures, Evie panics when the hands push harder against the canopy. She tumbles out of bed, knocking the lamp to the floor, and crawls beneath it. Lying still, she looks around the room from under the bed, and sees a shadow pass over the wall, then hears the sound of the bed's frame creaking, and sees the edge of the cover being pushed over its side. It's suddenly pulled back up and, following a beat of silence, the same pale, 

clawed hand reaches down. Evie is then dragged out from the other side of the bed, only to calm down when she finds it's Walter. She tells him that there's something in the room, but when he gets up, walks over to the door, and turns the light on, he's unable to find anything. She doesn't see anything either, and he comforts her when she begins to grow upset over this.

Following the revelation of what's going on, and her being chained up in the cellar, Evie is then trapped inside of a coffin by Viktoria, while Dee, who's still alive, is taken away to be made Evie's first victim at the ceremony. The following day, it's revealed that she's been fruitlessly trying to find a way to pry the coffin open with her fingernails. Just when she gives up, the lid is suddenly pried open with a crowbar by none other than Mrs. Swift. After getting her out and rushing he down the hallway, explaining why she's helping her, they hear it's been discovered that Evie 

is missing. Mrs. Swift sends her on her way and as she continues down the hallway, she hears all of the service bells ringing at the same time. Field, brandishing a meat cleaver, stalks the halls, seeming to sense that she's in there somewhere. She makes it out onto the grounds and, seeing some servants searching for her, quickly heads for the ice house at the edge of the woods. Ducking inside, she's horrified to find the bodies of numerous maids lying on the floor. Then, hearing someone opening the door, she hides, as Field and another servant come in, carrying 

Mrs. Swifts body. They throw her onto a large block of ice on a chopping table, which Evie is hiding under, and she sees her head hanging down over the side of it. She then hears Field tell the servant to continue searching the grounds, and quietly gasps when some of Mrs. Swift's blood drips onto her face. Field apparently hears this and quietly walks to the back of the ice house, looking behind the table. Evie then quickly crawls out from under it, runs out the door, shuts it, and uses a long tool that she grabbed as 

a makeshift locking bar. As Field angrily bangs on the other side of the door, Evie rushes through the woods and soon sees a small town in the distance. She reaches it by nightfall, and finds her way to the Harkers' antique shop. Of course, it doesn't take long for her to learn she's still not safe, as she sees the photo of the two of them at the Abbey, and realizes that Mina and Jonathan have called them. It also doesn't take her long to realize that Mina gave her some drugged tea. Still, she, again, tries to escape, throwing the tea in Jonathan's face and bolting for the door. But, Mina grabs a ceramic statue of a bulldog and uses it to knock Evie unconscious.

Upon being recaptured, and learning that Walter is actually Dracula once she's back at the Abbey, Evie passes out again as he drinks blood from the leg of the maid on the couch beside her in the library. She awakens to find herself wearing a bridal gown, with the veil down over her face, and being walked down the aisle in the chapel by Great Uncle Alfred. Once they reach the end of it, he lifts the veil, kisses her on the cheek, and sits her down beside Walter, who's kneeling at the altar. The dark-hooded master of ceremonies begins his sermon, while Evie looks and

sees Dee chained and gagged on the altar's left side. Then, after asking Walter if he takes Evie as his bride, he asks the same of Evie. She hesitates, and as everyone awaits her answer, Emmaline's final words flash through her head, as does her mother's message telling her that she's stronger than she thinks, and Lucy telling her that she will receive Walter's power. That's when she actually says, "Yes," and the master of ceremonies declares, "May you now exchange blood." Walter proceeds to open up his right wrist and Evie, very eagerly, latches onto his arm and drinks his

blood. He's initially ecstatic over this, and tells her that there will be plenty more later, but is surprised when she keeps drinking, then pulls away. She promptly becomes a vampire herself, as she sprouts claws and fangs, and declares that she wants Dee's blood next. She walks up to the altar and acts as though she's going to bite her, but then knocks all the candles over, setting the cloth and tapestry hanging behind the altar ablaze, and engulfing the master of ceremonies. As everyone panics, Walter jumps up 

there to stop her, only for Evie to grab a sharp object and stab him in the chest with it. He falls back, into Viktoria and Lucy's arms, while fear of Evie's wrath sends Oliver running out of the chapel. She promptly breaks Dee loose and ungags her, and the two of them flee the burning chapel. But, as Walter ages rapidly in her arms, Viktoria gives chase.

She chases them down the tunnel, tackling Evie as they reach the foyer, and slices at her with her claws while she crawls backwards along the floor. Evie grabs her arm, wrenches it over to the floor, and kicks Viktoria away. She then throws a ceramic vase at her, when Viktoria tells her that she hasn't stopped anything, as she didn't actually kill Walter. She brandishes her claws and sticks them right into Evie's chest, specifically over her heart. Dee comes up behind Viktoria and hits her over the head, but Viktoria merely turns around and floors her with a 

backhand. Evie tells Dee to go for help, while Viktoria grabs her and slams her against the wall. Before she can finish her off, Lucy suddenly slashes Viktoria across the back. Surprised and furious at this brazenness, she throws Evie to the floor, knocking her unconscious. She also finds Lucy unwilling to back down like before, declaring, "It's enough," and that she's not going to boss her around anymore. The two of them start swiping at each other, before grabbing each other's wrists and trying to overpower one another. Much to Viktoria's shock, Lucy manages to 

force her hands back against her chest, then rushes forward, pushing her back and impaling her, as well as herself, on the dragon statue in the foyer. Once they realize they're both doomed, they share one last silent, affectionate moment before their bodies begin to crumble. Evie comes to and looks just in time to see them both disintegrate into dust and blow away. However, she barely has time to react when Field charges at her with a spear. She grabs it but he forces her back, down a corridor to the right of the staircase.

They end up in a room where Field tries with all of his might to impale her, but at the last moment, she breaks off the tip of the spear and jams it into his throat. He quickly drops and she calls him an asshole, before grabbing a bit of piano wire she finds in the room (how convenient), and walking back towards the foyer.

By this point, the fire is spreading throughout the rest of the house, and as Evie heads down the corridor to the foyer, a light blows out behind her. But it wasn't due to the fire; it was Walter, climbs along the wall towards her. She runs out into the foyer, which the fire has engulfed the right side of, only for Walter to use his supernatural speed to get ahead of her. He grabs her by the neck and lifts her up, talking about how he was trying to save her from her miserable existence back in New York. After saying, "I hope you all burn," she brings out the piano wire, wraps it

around his right arm, and pulls it tight enough to slice right through it. He falls to his knees, right in front of the fire, and before he can get back up and attack again, she kicks him, sending him flying back into it. She watches him flail amid the flames before finally succumbing to them, and in the final moments before he's totally dead, she reverts back to being human. With that, as the rest of the Abbey completely burns down around her, she marches out of it. The epilogue cuts to two weeks later, in London, where Oliver 

walks to his office. As he does, he talks to someone on his cellphone, telling them that they paid off the police, and that they need to destroy the evidence and flee London. He also says that they don't have to worry about Evie, since she's no longer a vampire. But when he walks into his office, Evie and Grace walk into frame, as they prepare to get some payback.

The music score was the work of Dara Taylor, who went on to do the music for other movies like The Noel Diary and Strays. Overall, it's an effective score, but not a very memorable one, save for one frequently recurring motif: this freakish, discordant sound that feels like someone is really punishing the strings on a particular instrument. It's one of the first sounds in the score that you hear when the movie opens up, and you hear it many other times throughout it. And I can also remember some fairly effective, epic-sounding music that you hear during the climax, with my personal favorite being the one you hear when Evie walks out of the burning Abbey. Soundtrack-wise, you hear the song Floatin' by Gelo, which plays during the montage at the beginning where you see how Evie's life in New York is anything but enviable, and the song's lyrics reflect that perfectly. Also, the song Just Like A Dream plays on the phonograph when it suddenly kicks on before the first maid is killed, and Walter plays Antonio Vilvadi's The Four Seasons: Winter on it in the scene in the library between her and Evie. And finally, Mr. Badman, a sort of reggae-style song by Teddy Sinclair, plays over the first part of the ending credits.

Okay, so is The Invitation a great vampire movie? No, I wouldn't say so, as I would say others during this time period, like Abigail and Robert Eggers' Nosferatu are much better. It's certainly not for those who don't want to wait around for much of the movie before the vampires finally take center stage, and it also suffers from the vampire's ultimate plan being convoluted and confusing, as it being toned down to a PG-13 when it was in theaters. Plus, you can see where things are going if you're genre-savvy, as Walter De Ville never feels trustworthy, and the third act is quite predictable, with an epilogue that's a bit disturbing given the change in our lead character by that point. And for some, the similarities to Get Out might be a distraction they can't get around. However, I think this is worth seeing at least once. The actors all do their job well, especially Nathalie Emmanuel; it's well shot and the direction is often quite inspired; it has a great Gothic setting in a movie set in modern day; the way it drops hints about Walter actually being Dracula is quite clever; there are some atmospheric and spooky moments; the movie manages to get into social commentary without being too blatant about it; and if you do need a lot of blood in your vampire movie, the unrated version will likely quench your thirst. Again, not great, but I would call it good, which is acceptable in my opinion.