Movie Spoiler Summary: Intruders (Intrusos)

Juan Carlos Fresnadillo’s Intruders, based on an original screenplay by Nicolás Casareigo and Jaime Marques, stars Clive Owen as a father, John, who must save his daughter from the boogeyman, known as Hollowface. The creepy intruder also haunts the lives of another young child and parent. Yet, no one else can see this apparition, which calls into question the sanity of those who can. There is a twist, that might be picked up early on by the more astute, but hardly makes the payoff worth it. The film itself is more of an exercise in tension, which it has in spades, with some haunting special effects thrown in where parts or the entire face of people are wiped out of existence. And cinematographer Enrique Chediak’s (127 Hours, 28 Weeks Later) composition is just plain sick, easily the best thing about the film.

Movie Spoiler Summary
With rain pounding the windows, a Madridian (?) mother Luisa (Pilar López de Ayala) tucks son Juan (Izán Corchero) into bed after exchanging scary stories. He has a nightmare that might as well have been directed by Guillermo del Toro about a faceless monster. John Farrow (Clive Owen) works on a high-rise in London, while his family relaxes in the country. His daughter Mia (Ella Purnell) finds an unfinished story written on a piece of paper hidden inside of a tree, but loses her bracelet in the process. She reads the story about a faceless man to a captivated audience in school. For her birthday, her parents give her an antique teddy bear and a new electronic device. The spoiled bitch isn’t interested much in the former. Mia works on the story before walking in on her nude mother Susanna (Carice van Houten) who is sneaking a puff on a fag.

Back in Madrid, the rain is still pounding and something’s not right, so, naturally, they go to church, but she cuts her confession with Father Antonio (Daniel Brühl) short. While working on the high-rise, a genius unclips himself to reach a bolt and slips from the rafter. John saves him and later has a nightmare about it imagining the worker as faceless. Young Mia has a nightmare where she is faceless. Her father consoles her and teaches her the ways of overcoming her fears by burning an effigy of the faceless monster. Susanna literally rains on their parade with a garden hose.

Returning to rainy Madrid, the faceless monster can’t get enough out of teasing the boy. The next day, the mother summons the father ala The Exorcist. At the Farrow residence, Hollowface, as Juan has dubbed him, makes a cross-continental appearance and attacks father and daughter. John involves the authorities. It seems the creepy intruder has robbed Mia of her ability to speak.

The story shifts back to Madrid, where the boy cries caca-stained tears as Hollowface returns. The rain lets up (finally), after his mother comes to the rescue. Another day, another priest (Héctor Alterio). He tells his clerical counterpart that mother and son are both nut-jobs. In London, the speechless Mia visits a specialist (Kerry Fox). While the parents meet with the psychiatrist, John observes Mia writing her story. The Farrows have their house secured and alarmed.

In Madrid, the worried Luisa removes Juan from the playground as Father Antonio approaches. Mia continues writing her story. Despite the security in their posh home, Hollowface attacks the Londoners, sending Mia into anaphylactic shock.

Juan visits Father Antonio. Hollowface returns, but the Father can’t see him. The psychiatrist diagnoses John and Mia with Folie à deux, a hallucinatory disorder shared by two people with close emotional ties. Hollowface is no where to be seen on the surveillance tapes and social services is contacted. Mia reveals to the psychiatrist that she thinks her dad is bonkers and turns on him.

Father Antonio visits Luisa. The rain starts up again that night and Luisa presumably shacks up with the priest. The monster tries to attack the boy, but fails to, as he has just “completed” his story. He runs outside to hide it in the tree Mia will locate years later, which means Luisa and Juan were living somewhere outside of London. There is intercutting of the boy and John both climbing the same tree, but, as it turns out, thirty some odd years apart. In a surreal moment, Clive Owen enters the home of the now much aged Luisa and begins speaking Spanish to her. It turns out, he’s the aged “Juan.” Juan = John! Duh. I was stupid for not figuring it out earlier. He calls her on her shit about Hollowface being made up and passing on her hallucinations to him, which he inadvertently bestowed upon his daughter. Meanwhile, Mia is in deep-shit England, and Hollowface surrounds her Freddy Krueger style. John Juan tries to save his daughter by talking her out of the dream; interspersed in the sequence is John facing his youth. The mission is a success and Hollowface disperses into the ether. The End.