I finally watched all of the Invisible Man movies on the DVD collection I've owned for years and years. Here's the good, the bad, and the crazy...
The Invisible Man (1933) directed by James Whale
A heavily bandaged and goggled man shows up at the Lion's Head Inn, a countryside pub where the local populace is hanging out during a snowy winter night. The stranger is Griffin (Claude Rains). He demands lodging with a sitting room and a fire. He sets up a lab where he works to reverse his great scientific success--he's made himself invisible! The bar patrons are curious as are the bar owners. Griffin does not welcome their curiosity and hides his problem from them. Once Griffin can't pay the rent, they are ready to kick him out. By this time, the frustration of not finding a solution gets to Griffin, who is ready to kill and cause havoc to get his way. His scientist mentor (Henry Travers), the other mentee (William Harrigan), and the mentor's daughter (Gloria Stuart--the character is going to marry Griffin) come to help but Griffin has become too crazy and ambitious to listen even to his fiancee.
The story is full of speculation on how to catch an invisible man, along with various attempts at the more practical ideas. The movie has a good sense of humor and the effects are amazing consider the movie was made over ninety years ago. A few of the floating items are clearly on strings, which often gets the focus of reviewers, but a lot of other effects are impressive for the time. Rains gives a great performance, especially considering he is almost entirely just a voice. He sells the pathos and madness of his character. Una O'Connor reprises her role as the shrieking female comic relief from Bride of Frankenstein, overdoing it even more this time as wife of the innkeeper.
Recommended--This is an entertaining story with some impressive visual effects. It doesn't have the thematic depths of other Universal horror classics.
Geoffrey Radcliffe (Vincent Price) has been convicted of killing his brother and waits for execution. His best friend is Frank Griffin (John Sutton), brother of the guy in the first movie. Frank is also a scientist and works at the Radcliffe coal mine as a doctor. Frank visits Geoffrey on the eve of his execution. Geoffrey then makes a fantastic escape because he is now...the Invisible Man! Geoffrey was falsely accused and wants to find the true killers. He hides at a lodge with his girlfriend Helen (Nan Grey) and plans his next move. Meanwhile, the police are out in force at the Radcliffe estate. Geoffrey goes back to the coal mine where Frank works on a cure. Frank is not as brilliant as his brother and the madness slowly takes over Geoffrey, but not before he discovers the true culprit.
The movie plays itself as both an "innocent man" drama and as an "invisible man" thriller. Geoffrey is depicted as a good fellow driven to desperation by his predicament. As he goes about in his invisible state, he realizes all that he can do. Price has a great madman speech in the middle of the film where he tells how he can take over the country and have followers rather than friends. The speech seems like it's taken from the Gyges' Ring section of Plato's Republic, which is much less about desperation than about opportunism. The speech doesn't really fit Geoffrey's character though, even if it is well-delivered by Price. The filmmakers quickly get back to the "innocent man" plot and bring things to a satisfactory conclusion.
This movie is much more upbeat, with a likable hero in an unlikely predicament. Price is as solid a voice actor as Rains and carries the film through some rough plot patches. The special effects are the equal of the first film.
Recommended--There's a little more thematic depth and personality to this movie, making it an interesting companion to the original.
The Invisible Woman (1940) directed by A. Edward Sullivan
The invisibility gag gets played for laughs in this feature. Professor Gibbs (John Barrymore) has developed a machine to make people invisible but needs a human test subject. He puts an ad in the paper; unfortunately his financial backer, Richard (John Howard), has lost too much money as a playboy and can't finance him anymore. Instead of offering $3000 in a newspaper ad, Gibbs offers the treatment for free. A lot of crackpots send joking replies (like "make my husband vanish, please!"). Kitty Carroll (Virginia Bruce) is a dress model who's harried by her boss and seriously wants to be invisible to give him what for. She replies as K. Carroll and the befuddled scientist assumes she's a man. When she shows up, he has to sort out a way to take away her visibility without seeing her "in the all together," as he puts it. The experiment is a success. Just as the professor calls Richard over to see, Kitty sneaks off to pester her boss. When she gets back, she discovers some mafia thugs ready to get the invisibility machine so their boss, who is stuck in Mexico, can sneak back into the country unseen. She foils their first plan but all the pieces are in place to have lots of comedic incidents.
Virginia Bruce is fun and adventurous, providing her character with a lot of charm. There's no angst or world-domination plans; the story is played for laughs and, of course, a romance develops between Kitty and Richard. The rest of the cast is good (Shemp Howard from The Three Stooges is one of the thugs!) but the script is very corny and occasionally too silly for its own good. The special effects are a bit sloppy at times and were a bit distracting. This movie watches like a B-movie sci-fi comedy.
Slightly recommended.
Invisible Agent (1942) directed by Edwin L. Marin
Frank Griffin (Jon Hall), grandson of the original Invisible Man, is recruited to infiltrate Nazi Germany and get valuable information back to the Allies. But not before Japanese and German agents (Peter Lorre and Sir Cedric Hardwicke) try to steal the invisibility serum from him. Frank agrees to go to Berlin. They fly him in, he takes the serum, and he parachutes into the outskirts of town. Evading the local Nazis is fairly easy. Frank meets up with his contact who sends him to Maria Sorenson (Ilona Massey) a fabulous blonde who happens to be the paramour of Hardwicke. Hardwicke's flunkie Heiser (J. Edward Bromberg) is trying to get both the girl and his boss's job. Frank breaks up Heiser's clumsy attempt at a romantic dinner with Maria. Maria and Frank work together to get the info he needs before escaping back to England.
The movie was made in the middle of World War II and it looks like second-rate propaganda to stir up anti-Axis sentiments. The Germans have properly despicable attitudes and are just as likely to turn on each other as to fight against Griffin. Any chance to make them look bad is taken, regardless of how much sense it does or does not make for the plot. They are depicted as buffoons and sadists, a sharp contrast to the heroic Frank. This film is one of those propaganda pieces that you'll agree with but also find tedious. The visual effects are not too convincing, plenty of wires are visible.
Not recommended unless you are into propaganda films. Or want to be an Invisible Man completist.
The Invisible Man's Revenge (1944) directed by Ford Beebe
Jon Hall is back, but as Robert Griffin--no relation to the other Griffins in the series. Robert sneaks back into England from South Africa. He was part of an expedition five years ago to a diamond mine. He lost his memory when he was hit on the head by a branch and did not recover his memory until two months before returning. He looks up his old partners, Irene and Jasper, who are now well-to-do aristocrats. Robert wants his share of the money but the couple claims they lost most of the money through bad investments. They offer half of what's left of their wealth. Robert wants more. Irene drugs Robert's whiskey and they try to get rid of him. Robert winds up at the home of Doctor Drury (John Carradine) who has been experimenting in, you guessed it, invisibility formulas. He's made his pets disappear but nothing larger than a dog. Robert is on the outs with the gentry and thus with the law, so he's willing to be the first human test. After he turns invisible, he leaves the doctor and goes for revenge against his old partners.
The premise starts off ambiguous. Robert is fairly unstable and broke out of a mental hospital in Africa, killing some people along the way, so he seems a bit unsympathetic. His partners are upright until they drug him and try to dump him literally on the side of the road. Robert then goes down the madman's path, losing some of the sympathy he gained when the partners turned on him. The movie winds up as a standard b-movie sci-fi thriller with not a lot new to offer.
Mildly recommended.
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