Book Review: Universal Monsters: The Invisible Man by J. Tynion et al.

Universal Monsters: The Invisible Man written by James Tynion IV, art by Dani, and colors by Brad Simpson

A new version of the horror classic The Invisible Man is crafted by James Tynion. Jack Griffin is an obsessed scientist. He's studying monocaine powder, which has very unusual properties. Griffin wants to work in secret but he shares a lab under the tutelage (and financing) of Doctor Cranley. He's also been hanging out with Cranley's daughter Flora, who believes in him and wants to get married. But Griffin is much more interested in his monocaine-based formula which will cause a living being to become invisible. As he becomes more successful, he becomes more obsessed, more secretive, and less humane than ever.

The book does a good job creating a new storyline for the classic character. His larger story arc is familiar but plenty of details have been changed, resulting in new suspense and horror. He already has sociopathic tendencies even before he's exposed to monocaine's influence. The art underlies his secretiveness and hostility, with Griffin's face typically shaded in an environment already full of blackness, figuratively and literally. This is one of the better adaptations of the Universal Monsters canon.

Recommended.

Book Review: The Invisible Man by H. G. Wells

The Invisible Man by H. G. Wells

Griffin is a scientist who is working on a way to turn living things invisible. He has two problems: his lack of funds and his lack of morals. To finance his research, he steals from his father. Griffin is afraid of "thieving" professors at his university and wants to work alone so he gets all the credit. He sets up his own lab in London. He turna a cat invisible just as his money is running out. With the landlord breathing down his neck, he decides to turn himself invisible, imaging all the freedom and possibilities he will have. To cover his escape and ensure no one steals his method, he burns down the home where he's renting rooms. He has a lot of misadventures in London, finding it hard to steal money that doesn't turn invisible like him or keep warm with no clothes (being science fiction, only his body becomes invisible). He flees to the countryside where he works on a formula to restore himself while he is wrapped up from head to foot. The locals are suspicious of the heavily bandaged and taciturn stranger. They are right to be concerned, because he has quite a temper and, for all his brilliance, not enough practical foresight to resolve his situation in a happy manner.

Wells does a great job building up suspense, starting the story in the small town inn where Griffin frantically tries to undo his experiment. His backstory is slowly revealed. The narrative focuses on eyewitness accounts, giving it a "police procedural" style long before such a genre existed. The real genre is science fiction, with an extended explanation of the mechanics of his invisibility, which is not quite convincing over a hundred years later. There's an element of horror, too, as he terrorizes people into doing what he wants. His evil streak is more his own than a result of the experiment (though one of the characters does say that the drugs involved cause mental problems). The situation serves to highlight his corruption. The story is compelling and has become a classic for a good reason.

Highly recommended--it's a quick read and Griffin is an interesting if unlikeable character.

This story was covered in Episode 311 of A Good Story is Hard to Find Podcast, go check it out!

Movie Review: The Invisible Man (2020)

 The Invisible Man (2020) written and directed by Leigh Whannell

Cecilia (Elisabeth Moss) is literally trapped in a horrible marriage. Her husband Adrian (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) is manipulative, possessive, and a brilliant scientist. Their California seaside estate has a tall wall around it. As the movie starts, Cecilia sneaks away in the middle of the night, shutting down the security cameras and heading over the fence to a rendezvous with her younger sister Emily (Harriet Dyer). As Cecilia leaves the garage, their dog bangs into the car, setting off the car alarm. Her race to the road is just barely successful. The movie jumps two weeks later. Cecilia is hiding out with a friend of her sister. Emily comes by and tells her that Adrian committed suicide. The sisters visit the executor of Adrian's estate, his brother Tom (Michael Dorman), who explains that Cecilia will inherit five million dollars in monthly installment of one hundred thousand dollars as long as she is not charged with any crimes and is mentally competent. She's happy about that, though still paranoid about Adrian's influence over her life. Odd things start happening to her, making her think that Adrian is still alive and invisibly torturing her. Everyone else thinks she is going crazy.

The movie does a good job for the first third leaving viewers in suspense about whether Adrian is really alive and messing around with her. Tom does have a box with Adrian's alleged ashes. So maybe Tom is trying to keep the money by torturing her? Whoever is causing her problems doesn't need to put a lot of effort in since she is already skittish about almost everything. Also, her judgment is naive, like when she promises to set aside money for the friend's daughter as a college fund just to be nice. Cecilia grows less and less passive throughout the film, a nice build up of her character. The story has some good twists and tense scenes. The special effects are top-notch and the ending is typical and satisfying.

Recommended--I went into this with low expectations and was pleasantly surprised more than once during the movie.

Movie Review: Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951)

Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951) directed by Charles Lamont

Abbott and Costello graduate from a detective academy and are given the night shift at a local detective agency. A guy shows up offering them money to escort him to an address. The guy is Tommy Nelson (Arthur Franz), a boxer who is accused of killing his manager and is on the run from the law. He claims he's innocent and wants to find proof. The address is the lab of a doctor who is Tommy's friend and is working on an invisibility formula. The formula is the same one from the original Invisible Man movie (there's even a picture of Claude Rains in the lab) and has the same problem--it drives the recipient crazy and there's no reversing formula. The doctor is working on the cure and refuses to inject Tommy. Then the cops show up and the doctor goes downstairs to stall them. Tommy injects himself and works with Abbott and Costello to prove his innocence. Costello winds up mistaken for a great boxer (it helps if you have some invisible fists) as they investigate the boxing corruption that got Tommy falsely accused. 

The movie takes the plot of The Invisible Man Returns but switches it from a British coal-mine owner falsely accused of killing his brother to an American boxer falsely accused of killing his manager. A few of the special effects look like they were spliced out of the earlier film. And Tommy has a "I can rule the world" speech like the one Vincent Price delivered. The invisible man stuff in the story is mostly unoriginal. On the other hand, the comedy is a nice mixture of verbal sparring and physical gags that Abbott and Costello are so good at. One scene has Costello surreptitiously stealing cash from Abbott in a variety of funny ways. The final gag is ridiculous in good and bad ways. Overall, the movie is a fun, light comedy.

Recommended.

Movie Reviews: Invisible Man-ia

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.

The Invisible Man Returns (1940) co-written and directed by Joe May

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.