The Invisible Woman *** (1940, Virginia Bruce, John Barrymore, John Howard, Charles Ruggles, Oscar Homolka) – Classic Movie Review 5,624

Universal Pictures’ amusingly silly 1941 sci-fi horror comedy The Invisible Woman stars John Barrymore as mad professor Gibbs, who invents an invisibility machine and makes a model girl (Virginia Bruce) invisible to settle a few scores.

Director A Edward Sutherland’s amusingly silly, quite ingratiating 1941 Universal Studios sci-fi horror comedy film The Invisible Woman stars John Barrymore as the mad professor Gibbs, who invents an invisibility machine and makes a department store model girl Kitty Carroll (Virginia Bruce) invisible so she can settle a few scores.

Kitty has been fired from her last job, and uses her invisibility to pay back her sadistic former boss, Mr Grawley (Charles Lane). Meanwhile, gangster Blackie Cole (Oscar Homolka) sends in his gang of moronic thugs to steal the invisibility machine. 

Barrymore is at his most amusingly outrageous and Charles [Charlie] Ruggles is the other hit turn as George, the butler of wealthy playboy lawyer Richard Russell (John Howard), just one of the many trying to grab hold of Kitty. Russell has funded the Professor Gibbs to create the invisibility device.

Unfortunately Maria Montez hasn’t enough to do as one of the models, Marie, in her second film. Indeed, a remarkably fine cast is lavishly squandered on this daft item, which is the main reason why it is so entertaining.

Written by Robert Lees, Frederic I Rinaldo [Fred Rinaldo] and Gertrude Purcell, it is not exactly high quality material but it is enjoyable. Perhaps it is a shame they don’t take it seriously, but again it is enjoyable. The original story is by Curt Siodmak and Joe May. Comedy writers Robert Lees and Frederic I Rinaldo [Fred Rinaldo] are to blame for the screwball nature of the script, but that’s what the studio asked of them.

John Howard recalled: ‘We knew perfectly well The Invisible Woman wasn’t going to be an award-winning picture, but it was fun to do. No one took it seriously. Barrymore was an ordinary fellow. Even in pictures that you felt weren’t up to snuff, I don’t think he showed any disdain.’

The film was nominated for the 14th Academy Awards for the Oscar for Special Effects (photographic effects by John P Fulton and sound effects by John Hall).

Hilariously, the film was considered risqué because the heroine, though invisible, is naked much of the time.

It is Universal Pictures’ third Invisible Man film following The Invisible Man (1933) and The Invisible Man Returns (1940), turning the series into a spoof.

The cast also includes Oscar Homolka, Donald MacBride, Edward Brophy, Margaret Hamilton, Shemp Howard, Charles Lane, Anne Nagel, Kathryn Adams, Mary Gordon, and Thurston Hall.

Kathryn Adams, who plays Peggy, died on 14 October 2016, aged 96.

The Invisible Woman is directed by A Edward Sutherland, runs 72 minutes, is made and released by Universal Pictures, is written by Robert Lees, Frederic I Rinaldo [Fred Rinaldo] and Gertrude Purcell, based on an original story is by Curt Siodmak and Joe May, is shot in black and white by Elwood Bredell, is produced by Burt Kelly, and is scored by Charles Previn.

It was released on December 27, 1940.

Universal followed it with Invisible Agent on July 31, 1942.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5,624

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