Abhiroop Das
At the end of the Philippine mystery thriller ‘Uninvited,’ Lilia takes matters into her own hands and exacts vengeance. After spending the entire evening navigating the strange world of the rich, she has finally gotten close to her true purpose. Overcoming a series of challenging ordeals, she finally comes face to face with Nicole. With Guilly on his way, Lilia must quickly decide on her course of action. When a light is shone on the true nature of Guilly, past and present collide, with Lilia finding an ally in the most unexpected of places. The stage is set for a final showdown between the three characters, and catharsis awaits. SPOILERS AHEAD!
Uninvited Synopsis
The movie begins with Lilia Capistrano waking up in a cold sweat, calling for Lily, her daughter, who is nowhere to be found in the house. The scene then cuts to her driving to Guilly Vega’s lavish mansion, where he is celebrating his 55th birthday. Here, Lilia takes on a new persona, that of Eva Candelaria, and begins snooping around. She is looking for the billionaire’s immediate circle, which comprises his family and a gang of enforcers. At the same time, away from the celebration, many crimes unfold in a grassland under Guilly’s payroll, revealing his secret life of crime.
From here on, the narrative jumps between the timeframes. Simultaneously, we learn more about the people within the mansion and those in Lilia’s past. The focus is on daughters: one is Nicole, Guilly’s drug-addicted daughter who knows of his criminal operations and resents him for them, and the other is Lilia’s daughter, Lily, with whom she shares a loving relationship. Lily’s father died when she was 5, and Lilia was 50, yet he continues to be a significant source of emotional sensitivity for them. After praying at his grave on his death anniversary, Lilia enters a state of listlessness, born out of the fear of abandonment. She is afraid that Lily, too, will eventually leave her. Lily reaffirms her love, not knowing that this will be the last time she sees her mother.
While returning from a study date, Lilia and her boyfriend Tofy go missing, and a horrific truth is revealed. Seeking answers, Lilia begins her own investigation. Her reason for entering the mansion is unclear, but numerous hints are dropped, such as her expressing relief over not bringing a gun and thinking it is too soon to deal with Nicole. As the mystery around her actions grows deeper, more people become suspicious. Lilia must get to work quickly and bring justice to her daughter.
Uninvited Ending: Why is Lilia at the Party? Does She Kill Guilly?
Piece by piece, over the course of multiple flashbacks, the truth about what happened to Lily is revealed. She was kidnapped and taken to Guilly Vega’s secret villa, where he proceeded to sexually assault her. Lily had to endure many untold horrors before she was murdered; her body was stripped of all dignity and dumped along with Tofy’s in a grassland. When the bodies are eventually found, Lilia, along with Tofy’s mother, Norma, rushes to the grassland, only managing to catch glimpses of her daughter. Subsequent investigations led nowhere, except for one minor clue: Norma’s contact with the police gives her a list of similar victims, all of whom were paid to be silent by Guilly Vega. Having found the perpetrator for the brutal end of her daughter’s life, Lilia begins plotting her revenge.
Lilia’s entering Guilly’s birthday party is the first step of her plan. Initially, she struggles to put up her facade and make superficial conversations, instead choosing to wander around Guilly’s mansion’s large halls. During these digressions, she meets Guilly’s daughter, Nicole, and wife, Katrina, on two different occasions. Both women reflect a deep dissatisfaction with being trapped in the middle of Guilly’s whims and uninhibited criminal activities. In his birthday speech, Guilly boasts of beating the generational curse of cancer running in the patriarchs of the family, unconscious of the monstrosity he has given rise to in the daze of his filthy desire and crimes — Lilia makes it her mission to wipe him out of existence.
After carrying out various stages of her plan, Lilia finally finds herself face-to-face with Nicole. As she prepares to kill her, Nicole reveals the truth about her dynamic with Gilly. With this revelation, Lilia’s resolve to kill Nicole breaks down, and she spares her life. However, right at this moment, Guilly shows up, pointing a gun at her neck. Ordering Nicole to retrieve Lilia’s gun, he begins his tantrum, upset that his birthday party has been ruined, and prepares to kill Lilia himself. However, Nicole interjects, saying that she must be the one to kill Lilia. As the final stage is set, Nicole makes a surprise decision: shooting her father instead of Lilia, who wastes no time in stabbing Guilly to death.
Who Does Lilia Target within Guilly Vega’s Gang?
While Guilly was ultimately responsible for what happened to Lily and Tofy, he was not the only one who called the shots. Lilia investigates his accomplices and, following a meeting with Ellmer, another bereaving parent, compiles a list of all of Guilly’s enforcers: His right-hand man, Jigger, bodyguard Celso Batac, the corrupt police officer Randall, who was handling Lily’s case, and lastly, Jomar, who becomes Lilia’s first target. This revenge, built upon parents, becomes a joint body against the corrupt structures upon which Guilly Vega and his lackeys thrive.
Jomar, one of Guilly’s goons, is at the heart of the process, as he is the one who scouts for teenage girls and kidnaps them. With this in mind, Lilia decides to kill him before the party. She finds him alone in the street and strikes him with her car, gravely injuring him in the process. She then shows him photos of his last two victims, Lily and Tofy, before assuring him that he had a chance to run away and survive this hopeless pursuit, as she proceeds to ram him with her car multiple times. Jomar’s death is officially registered as a hit-and-run, but it makes Randall suspicious. Later at the party, his warning to Jigger goes unheard, allowing Lilia to continue eliminating the culprits.
Next, she targets Celso Batac, tailing him till he exits the dining hall. Sensing her chance, she pulls out the knife she has hidden in her robes and stabs him multiple times in the back before piercing his throat. Armed with Celso’s gun, she begins her hunt, this time for Officer Randall. Upon coming face to face, the two immediately exchange gunfire. While Randall does manage to shoot her in the arm, he mistakenly grazes Nicole and kills her boyfriend. Lilia uses this momentary distraction to her advantage, gunning him down. The final accomplice, Jigger, is killed by none other than Guilly himself after he discovers that he is having an affair with his wife. Guilly’s thoughtless drive eventually results in his whole gang being taken out.
Why does Nicole Spare Lilia?
Despite killing Guilly at the end, Lilia’s journey is still far from over as she has to contend with Nicole bearing down on her with a gun. However, the latter surprises her by letting her go. Nicole does this because she understands that Lilia did the right thing. Initially, Lilia’s plan was a twisted one. She believed in the idea of a child for a child and that the death of her Lily could only be avenged by hurting Guilly the same way. In the scene, as Nicole tries to crawl away, but realizes the hopelessness of her situation, she remarks that she knew that her father would eventually have to pay for his sins, but never thought that she would have to be the medium for it. Lilia, annoyed at this reply, says that Nicole and her mother turning a blind eye to Guilly’s activities is the reason he gets away with it, and that she must face his monstrosity. Hearing this, however, Nicole laughs. Guilly’s monstrosity, after all, is not new for her.
In one of her earlier conversations with her boyfriend, Mark, Nicole says she hates everything about her father but loves his money. It is only later, at Lilia’s gunpoint, that the truth and the trauma glazed by this statement are revealed. Guilly began sexually abusing Nicole at the age of 7, while her mother, Katrina, remained indifferent to her suffering. Nicole pretends to herself that Guilly’s money is compensation for the abuse she had to endure because she found neither escape nor support. Now facing a mother who has come to take revenge for her daughter, Nicole sees the mother she never had and masters the courage to voice the truth of her own life, snapping the pretense Guilly Vega upholds.
Lilia and Nicole parse through each other’s trauma and reach a deep emotional connection. When the moment arrives, they both take responsibility for ending Guilly’s life of inflicting harm on others. As they both shed tears of cathartic release, Nicole asks Lilia to run, who stumbles to the exit, leaving the mansion behind. Nicole understands that Lilia did the right thing, giving her the courage to break free of Guilly’s shackles. Her decision to spare Lilia is thus an act of gratitude. Lilia’s eventual fate is left ambiguous, given the nature of her injuries. Nonetheless, she finds greater peace knowing that she has avenged her daughter.
Read More: Best Lifetime Thriller Movies
