The Invisible Woman (1940) User Reviews (50)

An Opportunity To Become Invisible

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 2 February 2008]

Watching this film, the minute I saw the opening credits and saw who was in the cast, I knew I would enjoy this and I was not disappointed.

Bela Lugosi was quoted as saying that when Abbott&Costello met Frankenstein some years later, it killed the classic horror genre that Universal was known for. If that was the case, I'm not sure how the genre escaped the executioner here.

The original film of The Invisible Man saw Claude Rains give one of his great performances as the scientist who becomes invisible, but with the terrible side effect of losing his mind. It's classic acting at its best.

In The Invisible Woman John Barrymore is the scientist who plays it like a cross between his own Oscar Jaffe in Twentieth Century and Gene Wilder in Young Frankenstein. Barrymore really looks like he's having all kinds of fun with the part. But he's smart enough not to experiment on himself.

Barrymore is a pet project of playboy John Howard who spends as much money on him as he does settling with women with whom he's had various amours, much to the distraction of Thurston Hall his family attorney. Hall breaks the news to Howard just as Barrymore seems on the verge of a breakthrough. All this is making butler Charlie Ruggles start looking for other employment. That and what follows.

So much so he's advertised for a human subject in an oblique newspaper ad. Two parties respond to the ad, the first is Virginia Bruce who likes the idea of invisibility. She wants to use it to even some accounts with her boss Charles Lane. Lane runs a department store and Bruce is one of several models he abuses with petty tyranny. Her scenes where she does even accounts are some of the funniest.

But a second party is also interested, but he doesn't just want to become invisible. Oscar Homolka wants to steal the secret and return to this country from Mexico where he's been living as a fugitive. So he sends henchmen, Edward Brophy, Donald MacBride, and Shemp Howard to steal Barrymore's machine.

I should point out that unlike Rains's film and other invisible man pictures, Barrymore invents some Young Frankenstein like contraption which you go into and are bombarded with rays to become invisible. In the hands of amateurs the machine does have some interesting side effects and not the ones Claude Rains suffered.

The Invisible Woman is used as an example of how low Barrymore's career had sunk. Yet even when Barrymore is slowly destroying himself with substance abuse in real life, the man's comic genius is apparent even in a film like this. In fact he led the entire cast in one big orgy of overacting where all these colorful people try to top themselves in scenery chewing.

The Invisible Woman did get an Academy Award nomination for Special Effects, but lost to Paramount's I Wanted Wings.

Note in the cast Maria Montez as one of Virginia Bruce's fellow models who shortly would be obtaining short lived stardom in her own genre for Universal Pictures.

The Invisible Woman is a very funny picture, a really good satire on the horror film genre. Made on a dime so to speak, don't miss it if it's ever broadcast.

The Model and the Nutty Professor

[lugonian · 6/10 · 15 March 2008]

THE INVISIBLE WOMAN (Universal, 1940), directed by A. Edward Sutherland, is an original story by Curt (billed Kurt) Siodmak and Joe May that has nothing to do with either the H.G. Wells story "The Invisible Man" nor the original 1933 motion picture from which it was based. In fact, THE INVISIBLE WOMAN is a comedy, a screwball comedy in the 1930s tradition, with an dose of science fiction and character types thrown in. The title role belongs to the attractive blonde, Virginia Bruce, while much of the praise for comedy goes to that "ham actor" himself, John Barrymore, in one of his several character performances, sporting glasses, white hair, mustache and a comical expression on his face, co-starring as a nutty professor who invents things, with one machine in particular he's been working on for ten years.

As for the plot, the screenplay goes through the process of character introduction, the first being Richard Russell (John Howard), a millionaire playboy with a handful of débutante girlfriends and a large selection of their photographs residing in a mansion with George (Charles Ruggles), his loyal servant. Following another one of his all night parties, Dick learns from his family lawyer, John Hudson (Thurston Hall), that because of his extravagances he is now flat broke. Professor Gibbs (John Barrymore), the second introduced character, has his laboratory near the Russell mansion with Mrs. Jackson (Margaret Hamilton), his housekeeper of 12 years, as his assistant. Unable to acquire the $3,000 needed for his latest experiment, Gibbs places an ad in the Daily Record newspaper asking for a subject willing to become invisible. Kitty Carroll (Virginia Bruce), the central character and the third to be introduced, is seen as a poor working girl in need of extra money. Working as a model for the Continental Dress Company at $16.50 a week, she and the other girls are at the mercy of the mean and demanding Mr. Growley (Charles Lane), whose greatest pleasure is bossing the girls and threatening to fire them whenever possible. Unhappy under those conditions, Kitty walks out after a customer tears her dress, hoping to some day carry out her threat by kicking Growley "right in the pants." She gets her chance after becoming a willing subject to Professor Gibbs by stepping into his machine that makes her invisible. With that done, it is up to Kitty to rescue Gibbs from the clutches of Foghorn (Donald MacBride) and his two stooges (Edward Brophy and Shemp Howard) wanting to use his machine to make their boss "Blackie" (Oscar Homolka) invisible so he could return to Russia unseen. Then the fun really begins.

In the tradition of creative special effects by John Fulton, THE INVISIBLE WOMAN comes off best with its quota of laughs during its first half with the invisible Kitty Carroll getting even with her employer (Lane) and scaring his snobbish clients responsible for nearly having her lose her job, while the second half revolving around the love-hate relationship between Kitty and Richard along with the comic henchmen stealing the invisible machine and kidnapping the professor where he is held hostage in Blackie Cole's hideout in Mexico, gets a little tiresome, though redeemed afterwards by some silly, though well-paced climax.

Aside from the amusing Charlie Ruggles making his scenes count, fainting on cue, with Margaret Hamilton unfortunately having little to do, there's Donald MacBride hilariously talking soprano (like "Jenny Lind") after walking through the invisible making machine that backfires on him. Others in the cast taking on lesser roles are Anne Nagel, Mary Gordon, Edward Conrad and Kathryn Adams. Look quickly for a young Maria Montez, not long before making her mark in a series of Technicolor South Seas adventure tales mostly opposite Jon Hall, as one of the models.

Unlike THE INVISIBLE MAN, THE INVISIBLE WOMAN spawned no sequels, nor is it relatively known in spite of it being part of "The Invisible Man" video and later DVD package over the years. Unseen (no pun intended) on cable television for quite some time, THE INVISIBLE WOMAN did have some revivals on the Sci-Fi Channel (late 1980s), American Movie Classics (1989-90) and Turner Classic Movies (TCM premiere: February 3, 2012). For anyone looking for a change of pace in regards to science fiction or comedy, THE INVISIBLE WOMAN is certainly one to consider. (**1/2)

A Mixed Bag But A Great Cast

[ccthemovieman-1 · 6/10 · 7 November 2005]

What a strong cast for such a silly and stupid (but still decent) movie! Classic movie fans know these names: John Barrymore, Virginia Bruce, John Howard, Charles Ruggles, Oscar Homolka, Shemp Howard, Edward Brophy and Margaret Hamilton.

They are all here in this female version of The Invisible Man. Actually, as stupid as it can get, it also provides a number of funny scenes so I guess it served its purpose.

It's only 73 minutes long, but it should have been shorter as the gags wear thin after 40 minutes. Ruggles almost steals the show as the butler. He provides most of the humor in a real slapstick manner. As in a lot of these old comedies, some of this stuff is really corny but I did laugh out loud at a couple things.

Bruce and John Howard are attractive leads and Barrymore is effective as the typically-portrayed-in-classic films eccentric scientist. It was also fun to see Shemp Howard, of Three Stooges fame, play a gangster, although a Stooge-like goofy one.

The special effects were good in their day but not now. In fact, the DVD is sharp enough that you can see the outline of Bruce's head when she's supposed to be invisible!

Wonderful comedy with an excellent cast.

[rudy-30 · 17 September 1999]

This movie is a winner all the way. Mad Scientist Barrymore with Margaret Hamilton as his housekeeper invents an invisibility formula for his patron. When a model, Virginia Bruce, gets a hold of it, all havoc breaks loose, from revenge on her tyrannical boss, Charles Lane, to Oskar Homolka and Shemp Howard, two villains trying to steal the formula for themselves. Charles Ruggles also provides hilarity as the butler/chauffer.

very amusing

[dav07dan02 · 6/10 · 19 October 2005]

Director: A. Edward Sutherland, Story: Curt Siodmak, Joe May, Cast: Virginia Bruce (Kitty), John Barrymore (Prof. Gibbs), John Howard (Richard Russell), Charles Ruggles (George), Oskar Homolka ('Blackie'), Charles Lane (Mr.Growley)

For this third installment in the Invisible Man series,Universal decided to do a comedy with a little twist. This time the invisible man is a women! Otherwise this film had no relation to the previous two. Not a horror but a rather lightweight,amusing little film.

John Barrymore plays a simple minded professor who has just created an 'invisible machine'. Rich playboy Richard Russell is financing the professor's 'research' so the professor has to convince him that he can actually make people invisible. Of course he thinks he is crazy! All the professor needs is a human volunteer so he puts an add in the paper. Lovely model 'kitty',played by Virginia Bruce, wants to teach her mean boss,Mr Growley, a little lesion so she answers the add. Things get a little more complicated when a group of thugs hiding out in Mexico see the add. Blackie ,the leader, sends his nitwit sidekicks to try to get the machine. I enjoyed this film and got quite a few laughs watching it. It is available on the Universal Legacy Series Invisible Man film set.

Enjoyable

[bensonmum2 · 6/10 · 11 March 2021]

A model named Kitty agrees to become a guinea pig for an eccentric scientist and his experiment. He intends to use a machine he's developed to make Kitty invisible. It works, but the experiment draws the unfortunate attention of a mob boss who has nefarious notions for the professor and his machine.

I think anyone who's written about The Invisible Woman begins by pointing out the obvious - it's a comedy - actually, a screwball comedy. There's not a single element of horror to be found. Other than the fact that The Invisible Woman was made by Universal, includes some nice special effects, and has the word "Invisible" in the title, this movie has nothing at all in common with its predecessor, The Invisible Man. Instead, The Invisible Woman features a light, engaging, breezy tone that worked on me. Thanks in large part to a fantastic cast (including John Barrymore, Virginia Bruce, Shemp Howard, Margaret Hamilton, and plethora of other familiar faces) most of the comedy works - highlighted by Kitty's revenge on her boss. I might not have laughed out loud, but I had a smile on my face the whole time. The film's pacing is also a plus. The 72 minute runtime flies by. And while this may have been a "B" film with a "B" budget, you'd never guess by looking at it. Like a lot of Universal's output from this period, The Invisible Woman looks far better than it has any right. The cinematography is on point.

So, comedy that works, solid acting, snappy direction, nice cinematography - sounds like a winner. If the film were a bit less predictable, I'd easily rate it higher. Still, a 6/10 from me.

6/10

The Invisible Woman (1940) ***

[Bunuel1976 · 7/10 · 8 July 2005]

Generally hilarious comedy, though not exactly a spoof on the "Invisible Man" series and, in fact, totally unrelated to the first two Universal films or the ones which followed it. A superb cast throws itself gleefully into the madcap proceedings, with Charlie Ruggles as the accident-prone butler and Oscar Homolka's homesick gangster coming off best. John Barrymore was one of the best actors of his generation and, while at this stage in his career he was mainly reduced to B-movie roles, he was never less than commanding and his comedic skills (as displayed so brilliantly in Howard Hawks' TWENTIETH CENTURY [1934]) are, quite simply, a joy to behold.

silly comedy, with invisibility played for laughs, not horror at all

[FieCrier · 7/10 · 30 June 2005]

Not by any stretch of the imagination is this a horror movie. It's a comedy with sci-fi and crime elements to it.

Nor is it much of a sequel to the original Universal Invisible Man movie. It has very little in common with that. The process whereby people may become invisible is different in this one (a combination of a laboratory full of electrical equipment combined with an injection), and it does not drive the person slowly insane. It's also heritable, though they never did make a Son of the Invisible Woman, mercifully, perhaps.

A rich playboy keeps a scientist his family had hired in his pay, although the playboy runs out of money. (Return of the Invisible Man did also have a scientist with the knowledge of invisibility paid by relatives of his original employers.) The scientist has not ever come up with anything useful if anything at all, but he has finally developed an invisibility process and hopes it may make his employer some money to get him out of his trouble. He places an ad for a human Guinea pig, and a female department store clothing model answers. She's looking for a bit of adventure, although the most adventurous thing she can think of to do when invisible, is to go kick her boss in the seat of the pants!

A criminal hiding out in Mexico hears of the invention, and hopes to use it to travel back to his homeland, where he is unwelcome. He's played as a very comic sort of gangster with a loud tie and bad toupee by Oscar Homolka. He sends his goons to get the machine.

The woman and the playboy seem to both want to like and not to like each other, and part of the movie is about their relationship. Almost taking it into the screwball comedy arena, really.

Anyway, while awfully silly it is also a fun movie.

Kingofdanerds' review of The Invisible Woman (1940)

[kingofdanerds · 4/10 · 5 June 2022]

After The Invisible Man Returns proved to be a big success financially, Universal decided to release another film that would be apart of The Invisible Man series. The Invisible Woman was released the same year as The Invisible Man Returns in 1940 and was directed by A. Edward Sullivan (Sky Devils, Steel Against the Sky, and The Sap from Syracuse) and stars Virginia Bruce (The Garden Murder Case, Flight Angels, and There's That Woman Again), John Barrymore (Twentieth Century, Svengali, and Grand Hotel), John Howard (The Philadelphia Story, Lost Horizon, and Bulldog Drummond Comes Back), and Charles Ruggles (Murder in the Private Car, Bringing Up Baby, and One Hour with You). The film was enough of a success to spawn a sequel in 1942.

A crazy scientist (John Barrymore) is conducting an experiment in testing if it is possible to turn humans invisible. An attractive woman (Virginia Bruce) volunteers and this gets the attention of some mobsters.

The Invisible Woman is definitely all comedy and no horror. So, don't ever go in to this film expecting this to be a horror film. I don't mind the filmmakers with trying with something new. But I really wish the film still maintained a sinister tone in this film. But, we get a screwball comedy. The comedy is largely hit and miss but when it gets absurd, I cannot help but laugh a little. Seeing the gender reversal of the Invisible Being is a nice change that makes the film stand out a bit from the rest of the films. The acting is a but silly if you ask me but what else can there be to expect from a 40's screwball comedy? The effects are still pretty good and again it is nice to see that they got an Academy Award nomination for their work. The villains feel like the stereotypical mobsters that you always see being thrown into a screwball comedy.

The Invisible Woman is just a really standard screwball comedy from the 40's and one that doesn't always make me laugh. Nothing special to see here.

The Invisible Woman

[Scarecrow-88 · 6/10 · 15 October 2011]

Played strictly for laughs, I'm hard-pressed to label "The Invisible Woman" a horror film, but the movie does feature within the "The Invisible Man" Universal Studios franchise even if it stands alone from the first two films. A professor and friend to a rich family who have been providing funding to his experiments for years, Gibbs (John Barrymore), has finally hit pay dirt, having developed an "invisible machine". Miss Kitty Caroll (Virginia Bruce; receiving top billing, although she's barely visible during most of the running time, her voice depended on to earn giggles) answers an ad to be the human guinea pig to be turned invisible, her reason to frighten a grumpy, horrible boss for a modeling company (she is a model and one of his many victims; we see in the sequence where she uses her invisibility to scare him that he fires a girl because she has a cold!). Gibbs promises millions to broke playboy Richard Russell (John Howard) when the results of lots of money poured into his experiments proves successful. Sufficed to say, complications ensue. George (Charlie Ruggles), the butler, is the main source of comedy, his slapstick, physical comedy, and dialogue always on the silly side... He often faints, and gets nervous very easily, stuttering and quivering like a ninny. With goofy mobsters (including Shemp Howard of Three Stooges fame) after the invisibility (boss Oscar Homolka(William Castle's "Mr. Sardonicas") wants to become invisible so he can return to America, remaining a fugitive in Mexico), "The Invisible Woman" never remotely approaches horrifying, so you might as well place this as an invisibility comedy alongside "Now You See Him, Now You Don't" or "Memoirs of the Invisible Man". There are plenty of special effects featuring shenanigans involving Kitty (she gets drunk on Russell's well stocked booze when Gibbs and her go to Richard's hideaway hunting lodge, and we see the bottle pouring scotch into a glass while Kitty is invisible), such as a missing head while she is in dresses, a club bopping mobsters on the head (knocking them unconscious), and often foiling Homolka and his goons. Definitely inferior to the previous films which had a level of intensity in the storyline due to the progressing madness caused by remaining invisible (with an antidote hard to come by), "The Invisible Woman", nevertheless, has its fun moments thanks to a game cast playfully giving over to the kooky screenplay and dialogue.

Barrymore meets Bruce

[JohnHowardReid · 8/10 · 17 November 2006]

Agreeably played for low farce by a most accomplished cast led by those supreme farceurs Charlie Ruggles (who has all the best lines) and John Barrymore (who just manages to snare all the best "business" from Ruggles—who gives him a great run for his money), The Invisible Woman is smoothly directed with lots of great visual effects for those who dote on this sort of thing. Adding to the fun, Charles Lane has a colorful role which he makes the most of, but Maria Montez is along purely for decorative value as part of an eye-appealingly feminine crowd and doesn't have a single line, alas. Not one! It's the lovely Virginia Bruce who makes all the running, while John Howard stands on the sidelines, looking nice and stylish as the straight man. Comic gangster Oscar Homolka and other players do a few turns with three stooges (Shemp Howard, Ed Brophy and Donald MacBride), but the film's funniest scenes occur in the middle section of the movie when the invisible Virgina tangles with the irascible Lane.

It will remain invisible in my memory

[searchanddestroy-1 · 6/10 · 10 October 2022]

If you crave for the invisible character topic from the old times, choose instead AMAZING TRANSPARENT MAN, or THE INVISIBLE MAN, they are the best in the genre. But this one is not bad, that's only a comedy, romance movie, using the invisible element. That's funny, light hearted, excellent for family audiences with children and the puppy dog. Or for gem diggers. The only good point for me is that it is short. Universal Pictures was specialized in such films, Wolf Man, Frankenstein, Dracula, and I don't think that characters were made in comedies, except the Abott and Costello films. So, to summarize, this cute little feature is not destined to die hard horror movies from the thirties and forties.

Loud and stupid slapstick comedy

[preppy-3 · 2/10 · 1 May 2018]

A scientist (a sadly aged John Barrymore) invents a machine that can turn people invisible. He experiments on a young woman (Virginia Bruce) and it works. However the effect wears off after a while. Then some buffoonish gangsters get involved and the movie becomes unbearable.

Squarely aimed at kids and full of violent unfunny slapstick. The cast (which also includes John Howard and Margaret Hamilton) are good but the material isn't there for them. The special effects are good but sparsely used (the film is only 70 minutes). The biggest problem in this film is seeing the great John Barrymore looking terrible in what was one of his last film roles. The role is clearly beneath him but he gives it his all. Still this is an unfunny and violent comedy that is forgettabke. Skip it.

The Horror in This One Is........Invisible

[BaronBl00d · 23 December 2001]

Universal film billed as a part of its Invisible Man series has little except the title to do with that film and The Invisible Man Returns. This film is a comedy all the way with Virginia Bruce playing a woman who volunteers to be invisible for scientist John Barrymore so he can let his money man John Howard patent the product and become wealthy again after years of womanizing and eventual bankruptcy. Very light fare here, but in the typical Universal way very entertaining. John Barrymore gives a good performance as a very thick slice of ham. At one point, he is talking to a mouse like an overbearing Shakespearean stage trouper. Barrymore also has some wonderful verbal assaults with his house maid, played by Margaret Hamilton from The Wizard of Oz fame, and Charlie Ruggles, who does an outstanding job as a butler lacking courage. Much of the film is silly patter with Bruce exacting revenge on her mean boss played with the usual flair that only Charles Lane can create. Decidedly a notch below the first two installments of The Invisible Man series and The Invisible Agent, but the film was fun nonetheless. Where else can you see such a great cast with Barrymore, Lane, Ruggles, Hamilton, Bruce, and even Oskar Homolka(very interesting seeing him young!) and even Shemp Howard! The best part for me was watching Barrymore try to convince Bruce about the negative effects of drinking, even at one point saying, "dissipate and disappear!" What an actor!

Light entertainment

[davidmvining · 6/10 · 14 October 2022]

The Universal Horror franchise had been toying with comedy for several years, making it more prominent after the change of ownership at Universal Pictures. With The Invisible Woman, though, the franchise reaches full comedy and the results are surprisingly decent. It's too busy and not all of the comedy really works, but this is a light entertainment that takes a concept first used for really effective horror and makes a little comedy out of it. I'm more okay with that than the unimaginative turn into the familiar that we got with The Invisible Man Returns.

A wealthy lawyer, Richard Russell (John Howard), is running out of money after a series of affairs with young attractive women that leads him to settlement payout after settlement payout, much to the increasing chagrin of his loyal butler George (Charles Ruggles) who keeps quitting and coming back. Russell employs an eccentric inventor Professor Gibbs (John Barrymore) who has the key to his salvation: an invisibility machine that he puts an ad in the paper to find a willing participant. In walks the low-end model Kitty Carroll (Virginia Bruce) who decides that she desperately wants invisibility to give her mean boss Growley (Charles Lane) a literal kick in the pants without him knowing it's her (this movie has very low stakes). The experiment is a success except that Kitty leaves before Richard can see (or not see, a lot is made of this attempt at a pun) the evidence since when she finally comes back the effect wears off and she becomes visible again.

This is all pretty standard stuff that would later dominate sitcoms with the rise of network television. It's very light with little risked and little gained. It's slightly amusing, mostly from two actors, Ruggles and Margaret Hamilton as Gibbs' housekeeper, and it's functional narratively. Into this comes the henchmen of the exiled gangster Blackie Cole (Oskar Homolka) in Mexico, led by Foghorn (Donald MacBride), who want the invisibility so that Blackie can *checks notes* return to the city to take in the ambiance. Seriously, very low stakes. After Gibbs and Kitty chase Richard to a country property, the gangsters steal the machines while a labored comedy scene of Gibbs trying to keep the knowledge of the invisible woman from George (none of which matters because he finds out anyway and there's no narrative problem with that) plays out until Richard finds out and decides that he's going to fall in love with this invisible woman. Sure. He might as well, and she might as well as well because why not.

There's a kidnapping, some comedy stylings around using the machine wrong, and a showdown at Cole's remote compound. There's a comedic setup around the invisibility being extended and even triggered by alcohol, and some decent special effects. That being said, that this was nominated for Best Special Effects at the Oscars is honestly an indication of how incredibly primitive and little used special effects were in Hollywood at the time. First of all, I don't think this created a single new technique from the previous two films. Secondly, there's a whole lot of wires visible. That this wasn't figured out seems to indicate that the production was super cheap.

So, is it any good? It's okay. Charles Ruggles is in most of the film, and aside from his early slapstick stylings, he's actually pretty funny (Margaret Hamilton, disappointingly, just kind of disappears from the film after a certain point). It also has a nice, light tone that never takes itself seriously, poking fun at Kitty's implied and near-constant nudity while also giving John Barrymore room to simply take his eccentric professor character as far as he can (this isn't exactly Twentieth Century levels of hilarity, but it's pretty good).

Narratively, use of gangsters is so out there it feels like it should be borderline surreal in its inclusion, but it's so low stakes (they couldn't have a great plan to rob a bank, or something, that required invisibility?) that I question its inclusion at all. The romance is thin and unbelievable, as well. However, it's nice. It's quick at only 72-minutes long, and it's pretty consistently amusing. It's okay.

She's Naked and Wants, uh, Richard

[Cineanalyst · 7/10 · 3 October 2018]

I was surprised how uproarious this comedic turn in Universal's invisibility series is (much better than the 1951 Abbott and Costello film), and it's especially rewarding after reading the novel by Wells and seeing a few reworkings of it. The third installment in the studio's multi-picture deal for the rights to the concept, "The Invisible Woman" can't be classified in the horror genre as with its dramatic, if occasionally campy, predecessors, "The Invisible Man" (1933) and "The Invisible Man Returns" (1940), and it doesn't really have anything to do with the book. The science fiction is a bit different here, too, involving a screen and other gizmos in the vein of the 1931 "Frankenstein," and the invisibility is temporary and affected by alcohol. Once again, John P. Fulton's Oscar-nominated traveling mattes for the transparency visual effects are outstanding for their time. More vital, however, is the light touch--even goofy--of a scenario involving a frequently stripping and mostly naked, albeit invisible, woman surrounded by men for most of the runtime. John Barrymore's professor is a hoot of an old coot, and Virginia Bruce does an admirable job following in the footsteps of her invisible predecessors Claude Rains and Vincent Price--no easy task when one can't see the footsteps.

The slapstick is excessive, but that's forgivable in such a madcap sci-fi romp, and some of the jokes are so obvious that they're kind of bad in a good way. The see/sì joke, for instance, on the stereotypical mobster's over-used exclamation of "see" while talking to a Palermitani replying "sì" in a movie about what we see through. And there's also the use of pussycats instead of the dogs in the male-versions from the novel to the prior 1940 film in the series--the Invisible Woman's name is even "Kitty," which may not even be worse than the romantic male lead and proclaimed "playboy's" name, "Dick." Best of all is that the film's centering on an invisible woman both calls for the male gaze, as the characters and spectator look for the effect and await the appearances of her body, and rejects that gaze when she's unseen. You can't objectify what you can't see, right? Even though Dick does put a lamp shade on Kitty at one point, and the guys almost get a bit grabby at times in their searches for the transparent nudist. A fashion model, Kitty is enthusiastic about the Professor's offer of invisibility, which as soon as she gets it, she runs off to give her boss his just desserts for mistreating the models, while she decries the gaze of leering men buyers and the snooty women buyers. Plus, the narrative's focus is on Kitty's desire and active agency in wooing Dick, reversing the usual Hollywood dichotomy of active males and passive females.

I wonder how much more titillation there'd be had this been a pre-Code production or if it were remade today.

silly fun and a little sad

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 7 February 2012]

Virginia Bruce is "The Invisible Woman" in this 1940 comedy that has nothing to do with the classic "The Invisible Man." The sad part for me is seeing John Barrymore, one of the greatest actors who ever lived, in a character role in this B+ film (budgeted at a whopping $300,000, a great deal more than usual B movies), even though he was excellent and the film is very enjoyable.

Bruce plays Kitty Carroll, a department store model. She and the other models at the store are badly treated by their boss (Charles Lane) -- if they come in two minutes late, they're docked an hour, if they're sick, they're fired - he's a beast.

John Barrymore is Professor Gibbs, a scientist who has invented a machine that will render people invisible. His patron, the wealthy Robert Russell (John Howard) is now broke thanks to all the lawsuits he's lost to girlfriends, and tells Gibbs that he can no longer support him. Gibbs desperately needs to make a human person invisible so he can patent his machine and both he and Russell can make some money. He advertises and gets Kitty, who has a particular agenda in mind.

The Bruce role was intended for Margaret Sullavan, who refused to do it. Bruce is delightful, but with her in the lead, one thinks this was intended as a B movie when it wasn't at all. There are some wonderful characters on board, some of whom play gangsters trying to get their hands on this all-important machine: Oskar Homolka, Charles Ruggles, Shemp Howard, and Maria Montez. Margaret Hamilton is on hand as the Russell maid.

What can I say about John Barrymore, except the man was adept at both drama and comedy and adds a great deal to this movie.

Entertaining.

The 1940's Woman

[JayWolfgramm · 6/10 · 5 October 2022]

I can't help but poke fun at the gender issues on display in the movie. The first two entries are about a man turning invisible, going mad, and then becoming a murderer. I can imagine the producers asking themselves, "What adventures will the invisible woman get into?" "Well since it is a woman, clearly she can't be a crazy killer. So, this film is going to be a romantic comedy. She will be a fashion model, and when she goes invisible, she is concerned with how messed up her hair is."

So yes, although the last two invisible movies were horrors, this one is a romantic comedy. I give credit to Universal's "invisible person" franchise, because each entry is distinct from the previous.

All that being said, there are some very funny bits in this movie. There are some painfully dumb moments, but still some legitimate laughs, and not just at the movie's expense. The movie has a fair amount of slapstick but does not use Shemp to his full potential.

Thus far, this is also the most technically sound of the franchise. The invisible effects in this movie are top notch.

Missed opportunity, the tagline of this movie really should have been..."it was love before first sight".

What was the point, it's not even funny

[ashecatlin · 1/10 · 21 October 2020]

I don't even know why this was included in the Invisible Man boxset, it has nothing to do with the story.

A woman isn't happy about being told off for being late, so she takes an offer to get turned invisible by a nutty professor. She then gets her revenge, that takes up the first 20 minutes of the movie. Then without anything left they insert some random mafia guys who want their boss to be turned invisible so he can see his mum, yep they really went with that. Add a billionaire who falls in love with the woman and that's the movie.

I couldn't really watch all of it, it was so dreadful! I kept looking at my phone it was so dull. The initial scene set this movie up perfectly, with a butler tripping on a wine bottle and falling down the stairs, only to get a knock at the door answer it and then get knocked over again. There is some much forced humor in this and non of it was funny, they love story was just thrown in. The guy likes to sleep with woman and somehow he becomes smitten with her, from some unknown reason.

At the end she is beating up the mafia, seriously. Then the guy comes to the rescue so she pretends that she is in danger, he set off and automatic gun that shoots and him and his friends but when he finds her and dives in a pool to save her. She just laughs and it's a happy ending, it's just awful, to the point where I'm actually looking forward to watching abbott and costello meet the invisible man.

Like B Movie

[cherold · 6/10 · 12 August 2016]

A silly, affable movie about a scientist working on an invisibility formula, The Invisible Woman is well paced and sometimes quite amusing. Still, its mix of scientists, millionaires Illinois gangsters, and models, seems a bit disjointed.

The movie has a slow start, but things pick up once it moves on to the invisibility gags. The romance is fantastically unconvincing, but what do you expect for a movie like this?

The cast is quite good, particularly John Barrymore, who has fun as an eccentric scientist, and Charles Ruggles as a perplexed butler. It's pretty typical of a 1940 B comedies, so if you enjoy those, as I do, it's worth watching.

Sci-fi comedy is painfully unfunny although full of special effects...

[Doylenf · 5/10 · 3 February 2012]

THE INVISIBLE WOMAN barely manages to keep the title lady visible, so it's astonishing to learn that the role was first offered to Margaret Sullavan who wisely turned it down.

When she is viewed, VIRGINIA BRUCE does her usual bland routine of being pretty but vapid. The silly comedy has JOHN BARRYMORE as a nutty professor whose invisibility machine is willingly tested on a woman who wants to get back at her boss (CHARLES LANE) for mistreating his models. One of these models, without any lines to speak, is MARIA MONTEZ who in a short space of time would be starring in her own films for Universal.

JOHN HOWARD is the male lead who flirts with the invisible gal (he gets a view of her gams when she puts on nylon stockings) and wants to see the rest of her. MARGARET HAMILTON is Barrymore's long-suffering maid with a few acid lines, but the rest of the cast struggles to keep things in a cheerful mood when the script insists on being funny.

What could have been a neat mixture of thrills and comedy is defeated by an annoying script that depends solely on the special effects to keep viewers awake. Otherwise, there's not much to look at.

CHARLES RUGGLES has the task of being foolish, as does DONALD MacBRIDE, Oscar HOMOLKA and SHEMP HOWARD.

The sophomoric slapstick humor is only for kids. Surprisingly, JOHN BARRYMORE, toward the end of his career, is the only player who seems to relish his role and does rise above the material as the nutty inventor.

The Lady Vanishes and Laughs Appear

[CommandoCody · 10/10 · 29 January 2003]

Dispensing with the melodramatic excesses of Universal's previous "Invisible Man" films, The Invisible Woman aims strictly for laughs in this dated but still enjoyable comedy. The film puts to good use the considerable leering talents of John Barrymore. Allegedly, he ad-libbed his way through the entire film. Luckily, for him the plot was hardly rocket science. The eccentric Professor Gibbs (Barrymore) invents a weird contraption that under the right circumstances bestows temporary invisibility. What he needs is someone to act as a guinea pig. So, he does what any self-respecting wacko would do in such a situation--he places an ad in the local newspaper. Enter Kitty Carroll (Virginia Bruce), an eye-catching model with a spunky attitude. Kitty is eager to become invisible so she can teach her boss, a grouchy sourpuss if there ever was one, a much needed lesson in humility. Even having to run about in the altogether in order to be invisible doesn't deter her. The sponsor of these shenanigans (John Howard) is a fatuous moneybags who has lost his fortune and is in need of another. He is irresistibly drawn to the shapely specter like a magnet.

Things become more complicated after Gibb's ad makes its way down to the Mexican hideout of mobster Blackie Cole (Oscar Homolka). He wants the invisibility machine for his own nefarious purposes. Fortunately, for law-abiding citizens, Blackie's saddled with three moronic henchmen. Consequently, Blackie and his gang don't stand a ghost of a chance against the clever and resourceful invisible woman.

Though the special effects for this film are poor by any standards, a talented and likable cast of comical characters overcomes this shortcoming to make this one of the best films in Universal's "invisible series." Oddly enough, Virginia Bruce wasn't the first choice for the role, Margaret Sullivan was, but she sued Universal to avoid doing the film. Ms. Sullivan lost the case but Universal decided not to use her anyway. Viewers were better off as a result. The studio would be wise to update and remake this movie with someone like Charlize Theron in the lead.

See through - not clothes

[kosmasp · 7/10 · 17 October 2023]

No pun intended - I mean clothing that is see through - mostly known to be on women. Well more discussed may be the better term or definition of the .. not pun I tried to make. Also this begins to leave the serious topics and going a bit of the silly route ... also jokes about clothes included ... like talking about a naked woman being indecent. Well I reckon it is ... but not in the way it is portrayed.

Of course this being a movie from the 1940s, there is no nudity in this, so do not worry (if you did). But there are some innuendos and the movie is quite self aware ... I reckon the studios realized the audience was getting savvy ... and they knew what to expect. Wouldn't call it fourth wall breaking ... but it does go a bit into that direction. Abbott and Costello were not too far away then ... Effects still amaze me by the way ...

Faulty, little Invisible One....

[simeon_flake · 3/10 · 18 January 2019]

My mind can play tricks on me. Usually, when I think of the worst Universal horrors, I usually forget this or "She-Wolf of London," and with good reason; both are not worth remembering.

I think the only "comedian" worth observing is Shemp & beyond Shemp not really doing anything--aside from being a heavy--the butler is pretty good (Christopher Columbus); but beyond that and whatever "polish" the old John Barrymore is supposed to bring to the movie, the thing is just completely forgettable.

Even the rest of the cast--that may be easy on the eyes--can't bring me back for repeat viewings....

Cooky Sci-Fi Romp which anticipates later B-Movie Genre

[zpzjones · 22 June 2004]

This is the Great Profile's(John Barrymore's) next to penultimate film. It's an enjoyable romp through some sci-fi shenanigans. A wonderful cast co-stars & supports ie: Carol Bruce, Charlie Ruggles, Margaret Hamilton, Charles Lane, Oscar Homolka, Shemp Howard...S-H-E-M-P H-O-W-A-R-D! and even a young unknown Maria Montez before all of the 'Ali Baba' type technicolor spectaculars. You really have to look at the row of models at Carol's job to spot Maria. I really enjoyed this film. It's like the serious original with Claude Rains but albeit with comic twists thrown in. The whole family can go to the theater and have some laughs. The techniques for making Carol Bruce invisible are really well done here but it should have been expected as Universal made the classic original in 1933. Someone mentioned that this could be remade with Charlize Theron. I agree. And it could also be remade with Barrymore's own granddaughter Drew. This movie has a pretty good A list cast. Barrymore was still a name to reckon with. The flick IMHO sort of anticipates the B-movie cheese factor sci fi movies soon to come in the 50s & 60s and even kiddie Saturday morning 70s fair like the Sid & Marty Krofft's 'Dr Shrinker'.