Invincible is a 2022 short film (30 minutes) from Canada (specifically Quebec, so in French), directed by Vincent René-Lortie.
A teenaged boy, Marc, sits in a car and listens to his mother on the phone asking him to come home, but doesn't answer. Instead, he drives the car into a lake. The film then flashes back to Marc, having fun by that same lake with his family. However, he doesn't go home with his family—instead, he's dropped off at a juvenile detention center. Just what he's done to get put in a reformatory is never explained, but Luc, the social worker who has jurisdiction over the boys, says that Marc has to straighten himself out and behave to be released. Marc, as it turns out, isn't that patient.
Tropes:
- Based on a True Story: The film actually begins with the message "Inspired by a true story." Then the end gives the name of the real boy.
- Call-Back: Early in the film Marc freaks his little sister Justine out by holding his hand over a lighter and deeming himself "invincible." At the end, as Marc's frantic mother is trying to get him to say something on the phone—the family has already been notified that Marc ran away—Justine does the same, holding her hand over a candle and wincing from the pain.
- Downer Beginning: A teenaged boy drives his car into a lake.
- Driven to Suicide: Marc, a troubled youth in a juvenile detention center, kills himself by driving a car into a lake.
- Gratuitous English: When Quebecois swear words like "Tabernac!" don't seem enough, kids sometimes switch to English. Marc, being dragged back to his cell, curses the guards in French and then says "Fuck you man!" in English.
- How We Got Here: The film opens with Marc driving a car into a lake, then jumps back to earlier in his story.
- Juvenile Hell: Averted. It isn't a happy place, and one scene revolves around Marc being put in his cell and getting angry that the fan that is his sole source of cooling is broken. But the kids get to play basketball, they get to go to a pool, and they have real classes. Marc isn't being abused, he just can't abide being confined.
- Match Cut: Marc drives a car into a lake. Cut to an underwater shot of an object plunging beneath the surface—but it isn't a car, it's just Marc, diving.
- Real-Person Epilogue: The film closes with a title card saying "Pour mon ami, Marc-Antoine Bernier (1993-2008)", then shows a picture of the real Marc with his little sister by the lake.
- Title Drop: Marc holds his hand over a flame and says nothing will happen to him because "I'm invincible." His little sister Justine, who is watching this demonstration, is freaked out.
