James Whale’s The Invisible Man (1933) takes the viewer on an intelligent ride of horror, science fiction, fantasy, and human nature. The special effects compete with those made in Hollywood today, and the acting fell nothing short of my high expectations.
Many of the scenes at the beginning of the movie though, seemed very intuitive and often obvious. Unlike “The Bicycle Thieves,” Whale does not play with the audience. The opening scene of Jack by the road and the sight of him walking into the inn, with his head bandaged, and glasses on, makes it quite obvious who the movie centers around. The first glance of his invisibility comes when the wife of the innkeeper sees him eating. Jack then holds up a napkin to hide his invisible mouth, but the camera changes angles to blatantly display the “nothingness” under the bandages. Perhaps Whale’s eagerness to flaunt his special effects prompted this shot.
Soon afterward, Jack removes his bandages and exposes his invisible head. The fact that this scene came so early in the film surprised me. When I rented this movie, I thought that it was a horror movie. The idea of an invisible man stalking people and killing them seems very scary and haunting. Instead, the movie is more of the science fiction variety, with some random killing of people the viewer never meets. Like the recent movie “Jurassic Park,” which drew audiences partially based upon the realism of the dinosaurs, people may have seen this movie to see whether the invisible man was invisible. But, unlike the Spielberg movie, Whale should not have shown the special effect so early in the film.
In addition to the film’s visual and audio accomplishments, The Invisible Man represents society upon anther level. Primarily, the protagonist (which whom the movie is titled after), Jack Griffin, represents America during the early thirties. The depression has sunk in and Americans want a way out. “There’s a way back you fool, there must be a way back,” he says, when attempting to make himself visible. Also, similar to the depression, Jack wreaks havoc on the town, and goes so far as to kill police and even friends. He also derails trains, steals from the bank, and generally makes lives of everyone miserable.
What I found most interesting about this story was the lack of a lead hero. Unlike Hollywood today, I found it difficult to choose whom I should “root” for. At times I found myself cheering (and laughing) when Jack escaped, and other times I wish they would finally catch him. I attribute this lack of a lead character to the notion that no single person can help the country out of the great depression. The chief-of-police once says “A thousand replies have come to my appeal for suggesting ways to catch the invisible man, some of them clever, some of the stupid, but all of them are impossible.” At other times in the movie, the police and citizens work together in attempt to catch the invisible man, yet they fail—with great amusement to the viewer.
On one occasion, the police discover Jack inside a house. Knowing that he is invisible, the police and townspeople hold hands and surround the building (so Griffin cannot escape). To the humor of the viewer, the invisible man escapes and in the process, steals the trousers of an officer.
The movie also goes so far as to condemn the individual, especially those who wish to succeed. Jack says to his wife, “I wanted to do something tremendous, to achieve what men of science have dreamt of since the world began, to gain wealth and fame and honor, to write my name above the greatest scientist of all time.” For this, he ultimately pays with his life.
One must also note that the mere desire to accomplish greatness did not directly cause death, but instead the actions he took to get there. The convenience of associating the invisibility drug with causing madness in the user makes the story a horror movie. This madness caused Jack to do evil deeds, and for those, he deserves to die. Regardless, Jack no doubt shares the noble goal of greatness with millions of Americans, and from watching this film, this viewer can not help associating the desire for individual greatness with the greatest punishment.
I generally found the story very entertaining, but the underlying message disturbing. Yet when I view this film from the perspective of an early 1930’s American, I see hope. To idea of an entire society working together to conquer an enemy with supernatural powers, especially without any one individual standing-out, would increase the moral of anyone who saw The Invisible Man in theaters. The fact that they fail on their first try to catch Jack, should give the viewer even greater hope because it similarly shows that the great depression was not solved with the first attempt.
In the end, the townspeople catch the invisible man and end his reign of terror. They do this with luck (snow), sacrifice (of and old man’s barn), and by all of them working together. Thus, Whale’s intent of “The Invisible Man” is not to portray a realistic portrait of society, but to give an inspirational story to an economically crippled society. Additionally, while H.G. Wells may not have written the original novel as a reflection of the Depression, Whale brilliantly transformed it into an inspirational and entertaining product that reflected the views and hopes of the American people of that day.
A last thought on “The Invisible Man” is that although Jack dies at the end of the movie, and to the benefit of Claude Rains, becomes visible, the movie does not resolve what happens to Jack’s notes. Logically, any scientist can replicate Griffin’s experiment and thus we can see the entire story again. Leaving the option of a sequel . . .
--SirMontego, look for me on Battle.net
This is a paper I wrote during the summer of 1999 for a Cinema Studies 262, Survey of World Cinema, II: The Thirties to the Present class at the University of Illinois taught by David M. Desser Ph.D. University of Southern California 1981. I got an A- on this paper—a much higher grade than I expected.
As i recall, the assignment was to discuss the social, political, and economic aspects of the film and the time is was made.
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