‘Invisible Woman’ Will Star And Be Directed By Elizabeth Banks, Described As ‘American Psycho’ Meets ‘Thelma And Louise’
Universal is moving fullscreamahead with plans to revive their classic monsters. They have Leigh Whannell’sInvisible Manarriving next year and Dexter Fletcher’sRenfieldin the works, and now they’re adding another project:Invisible Woman.Elizabeth Banks will direct and star in the film, which apparently won’t be connected to Whannell’sInvisible Man. Universal made anInvisible Womanmovie released back in 1940, but the tone was comedic, whereas Banks' project is said to be a full-on horror movie.
THRsays Elizabeth Banks will star in and directInvisible Womanfor Universal. The tone of the film is beingdescribedas “Thelma and LouisemeetsAmerican Psycho”, and that actually sounds kind of neat. It also soundsmuchdifferent than the originalInvisible Woman, which was a comedy about a mad scientist who turns a model invisible so she can get revenge against the boss that fired her. Along the way, she gets mixed up with some gangsters who want to exploit this whole invisibility thing to their benefit.Erin Cressida Wilson, who wrote the not-so-great adaptation ofThe Girl on the Trainand also the excellentSecretary, penned the most recent script for the newInvisible Woman.I think Banks is quite a good actress with the right material, but her directorial efforts haven’t turned out so well. Still, it’s nice to see that she’s being handed another high-profile directing gig after the box office failure of her recentCharlie’s Angelsreboot. Male directors get to move on to bigger things after failures in Hollywood all the time, so it’s only fair that a female director can do the same. Progress!Invisible Womanjoins a growing line-up of new titles inspired by the classic Universal Monsters. Leigh Whannell hasInvisible Manarriving on July 07, 2025. Then there’s theDraculaspin-offRenfieldcoming from director Dexter Fletcher, and Paul Feig’sDark Army. Universal previously attempted to revive their classic monsters with the Dark Universe – an endeavor that failed immediately withThe Mummy, starring Tom Cruise.
Even thoughInvisible Womanpresumably involves invisibility like Whannell’sInvisible Man, the films will apparently not be connected. AsVarietyreports, “Banks' pitch is very different from theInvisible Manfilm coming out in February that stars Elisabeth Moss, and there is no crossover potential on either film.”
Having learned their lesson with the Dark Universe, Universal now wants “to creating compelling filmmaker-driven projects based on characters from the studio’s vast monsters legacy.” And “Instead of prescribing a mandated updating of these monster stories and making them all part of a larger scheme, the studio loosened these restrictions and open-sourced to filmmakers who were inspired to create their own unique stories.”
