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Films: The Invisible Man, The Invisible Man Returns, The Invisible Woman, Invisible Agent, The Invisible Man’s Revenge
Stars:
Claude Rains, Gloria Stuart, WML Harrigan, Dudley Digges, Una O’Connor, Henry
Travers, Forrester Harvey, Vincent Price, Nan Grey, John Stutton, Cecil Kellaway,
Virginia Bruce, John Barrymore, Maria Montez, John Howard, Charlie Ruggles,
Oscar Homolka, Ilona Massey, Jon Hall, Peter Lorre, Sir Cedric Hardwicke,
Ledward Bromberg, John Litel, Albert Basserman, Jon Hall, Leon Errol, John
Carradine, Alan Curtis, Evelyn Ankers, and Gale Sondergaard
Writers:
R.C. Sherriff, Kurt Siodmak, Joe May, Robert Lees, Fred Rinaldo, Gertrude
Purcell, Curtis Siodmak, and Bertram Milhauser
Based On And
Suggested By “The Invisible Man” By: H.G. Wells
Director: James
Whale, Joe May, A. Edward Sutherland, Edwin L. Marin, and Ford Bebbe
Feature lengths:
71 minutes/ 82 minutes/ 72 minutes/ 81 minutes/ 77 minutes
Extras: Feature
Length Audio Commentary With Film Historian Rudy Behlmer, “How You See Him:
The Invisible Man Revealed” Documentary, Production Photograph Gallery,
Theatrical Trailer
Languages: English
Two-Channel Monaural Sound
Subtitles: English
Captions and French and Spanish Language Subtitles
Packaging:
Two-Disc Digipack
Chapter Stops: 18
Per Film
Sound: Two-Channel
Monaural Sound
Years of
Theatrical Release: 1933/1940/1942/1944/DVD Release: 2004
Theatrical
Distributor: Universal Pictures
Home Video
Distributor: Universal Studios Home Video
MPAA Rating: Not
Rated
Reviewer: Mark A.
Rivera
Though the sequels
do not hold a dramatic candle to the original, the strength of James Whale’s
1933 adaptation of H.G. Wells’ “The Invisible Man” is so great, that the
entire set is worth buying just to have the original film and the exclusive
bonus features included within this two-disc set. In fact of the three new
“Legacy Collection” DVD sets released by Universal Studios Home Video to
coincide with the DVD release of “Van Helsing: Widescreen” on DVD-Video,
“The Invisible Man: The Legacy Collection” is my favorite. Claude Rains
plays a scientist who creates a mysterious concoction dubbed monocaine,
which has the effect of rendering the person invisible. However it also creates
delusions as well as psychotic episodes that drive the invisible man to commit
deadly acts of terror. In addition to Whale’s exquisite screen direction, the
film’s fantastic special effects still hold up pretty well for what they are
even by modern standards, but most importantly, Claude Rains portrayal is
nothing short of spectacular. His voice creates so much presence that he manages
to upstage nearly every other actor in the film and aside from the film’s
closing moments and the scenes where he is wrapped in bandages, Mr. Raines is
usually nothing more than an ominous disembodied voice. So potent is his
dialogue delivery that I would place the importance of having Claude Raines as
the invisible man as being equal to having James Earl Jones provide the voice of
Darth Vader in the “Star Wars Saga.”
Film Historian
Rudy Behlmer delivers a terrific feature length audio commentary for the film as
well and though he too sounds like he is reading from a book, his enthusiasm
makes listening to his words quite enjoyable. There is a lot I learned about
Claude Rains background that I never knew before just from listening to Mr.
Behlmer’s commentary. Rains had a speech impediment that he diligently worked
to overcome and became so masterful at speaking that he was soon able to
completely hide his cockney accent so that no one ever realized the hardships he
underwent growing up. In addition, he was a victim of poisonous gas during World
War I. As a result he was almost completely blind in his right eye and he
believed his distinctive voice was created as a result to damage done to his
vocal cords from the gas attack. Behlmer digs deeply into the background of the
film’s development and points out where the differences between the novel and
screenplay occur as well as some of the controversy that occurred when Boris
Karloff left the project after a salary dispute with the brass at Universal at
the time. Karloff’s departure from the studio is what opened the role up for
Rains to play the title character.
The audio
commentary is supported by a documentary entitled “How You See Him: The
Invisible Man Revealed” (35:19), which not only shows how the effects were
produced for the 1933 original, but also focuses on the film’s development,
production and the follow-ups as well as interesting background information on
Director James Whale and Actor Claude Rains with onscreen interviews that
include Film Historians David J. Skal, Paul M. Jensen, Actor Sir Ian McKellen,
and Claude Rains’ daughter. The documentary is hosted and narrated by Rudy
Behlmer too. There is also a motion gallery of one-sheet art and production
photos included (4:29) however the only theatrical trailer included in this
two-disc set is for “Invisible Agent” (1:44).
All five films are
presented in their original (1.33:1) black and white aspect ratio with varied
picture quality. In some ways I think “The Invisible Man” looked better than
some of the follow-ups like “Invisible Agent” for example, which was
released ten years after James Whale’s feature film version of “The
Invisible Man.” There is a bit of shimmering and artifacts left over due to
the available materials used for the transfer, but overall I think all five
films benefit greatly from the digital video transfer. A clear English
Two-Channel Monaural Soundtrack is provided for all the features along with
English Captions for the hearing impaired and French and Spanish Language
Subtitles encoded as options. The
menus are all standard interactive still frames that are easy to navigate.
“The Invisible
Man: The Legacy Collection” is available on DVD-Video now along with “Legacy
Collection” DVD sets featuring “Dracula,”
“Frankenstein,” “The
Wolf Man,” “Creature From The
Black Lagoon,” and “The
Mummy” at retailers on and offline courtesy of Universal Studios Home
Video.
© Copyright 2004
By Mark A. Rivera
All Rights Reserved.
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