Invisible Agent Review: More Invisible Comedy...blah

After Invisible Woman destroyed the creepiness and villainy of Universal’s invisible man creation, the invisible character’s menace would be difficult to re-establish. Thus, Universal decided not to even try. 1942 was the beginning of World War II, so Universal decided that if they weren’t going to restore the invisible man to a modicum of scariness, they could at least make audiences respect an invisible character again by having him take on Nazis. I wouldn’t exactly call Invisible Agent a rousing success, but at least it made it so that people could once again believe that the character had ORIGINATED as a scary one even if he was little more than a parody now. We get glimpses of a film that MIGHT have been, though.

At the start, Frank Raymond (John Hall of The Invisible Man’s Revenge) is working in a print shop making paper when he is approached by four armed men. Among them are Conrad Stauffer (SS Officer played by Cedric Hardwicke of The Invisible Man Returns and Ghost of Frankenstein) and Baron Ikito (the Japanese man is played by Peter Lorre of 1931’s M and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea – and if you think of Looney Toons and Bugs Bunny while you watch him, you’ll recognize him better).They know that Frank is living under an assumed identity and that he is actually the grandson of Dr. Jack Griffin. As such, they want the formula for invisibility. This is one of those “the film that MIGHT have been” moments where they put his hand in a paper press and begin to winch down to cut his hand off unless he tells them where the formula is. Lucky for him, he has to SHOW them and he’s able to snag the formula and get out of his shop before any harm comes to him.

Somehow the US government catches wind of the formula situation and tries to persuade Frank to let them use it. He refuses at first, but gives in when Pearl Harbor is bombed with his only stipulation being that the formula only be used on him since he knows how dangerous the formula is (monocaine and all). The government reluctantly agrees (some people concerned he lacks the training, but others are convinced that he has the conviction). He will be parachuted into Germany post-haste.

Upon landing, Frank seeks out his contact, Arnold Schmidt who tells him that his mission is to obtain a list of all the Japanese and German spies working undercover in America. To do that, he will want to contact Maria Sorenson (Ilona Massey of Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man). Frank does so and it’s from her that he learns a man named Karl Heisser (J. Edward Bromberg of 1943’s Phantom of the Opera and Son of Dracula) is soon coming over to have dinner with Maria. During that dinner, Frank generally plays pranks on Heisser and makes him look like a fool which, in a roundabout way, ends with the Nazi’s arrest and sentence to execution.

Frank is able to parlay that into Heisser giving him information on the impending Nazi attack on New York, which will save American lives. Frank also manages to get his hands on that list of spies, but when he goes to return it to Arnold, the confidant is not there anymore. Maria is there, and Frank gets a net dropped on him leading Frank to be convinced that she is a double-agent.

The whole movie is basically just a spy thing and turns into Frank vs. Maria vs. Stauffer vs. Ikito. Frank, we know, is trying to get information to the Allies; Maria is sickened by Stauffer but not yet trusted by Frank; Stauffer is trying to kill/capture Frank and only loyal to Ikito as far as is useful to Germany; and Ikito is basically the same as Stauffer only more sadistic.

Meh. I mean, it’s not a BAD movie, but the premise is so clearly a cash-in on World War II that it detracts from the film a bit. By making the villains Nazis, Universal really screwed the pooch. In 1942, you couldn’t portray a Nazi as a competent, worthwhile villain, so the main nemeses of the movie are relegated to being buffoons and slapstick clowns. It’s an unfortunate move that would be better used if American audiences could accept a convincingly scary film Nazi, but I bet your typical 1942 American moviegoer absolutely LOVED watching Nazis get kicked in the pants and poked in the eyes by an invisible American.

That said, this is one of the few comedy films from Universal that I don’t detest. The humor is actually quite decent and the plot makes some semblance of sense. Salvaging the series after the crapbomb that was Invisible Woman was no easy task, in fact, it was probably nearly impossibly, but by bringing back the Jack Griffin storyline, at least Universal brought the idea that the original Invisible Man was a serious flick back into the forefront of people’s minds. This wouldn’t be significant if the next Invisible Man film had been just another parody film, but Invisible Agent paved the way for the more serious Invisible Man’s Revenge.

The acting here is nothing to write home about. John Hall isn’t quite convincing enough as the invisible man and his changes in tone and takes on the character range too far all over the place from serious scientist, to secret agent, to moronic buffoon, and it just doesn’t WORK. Ilona Massey plays her role well enough I suppose but at the end of the day, I watched the more serious moments of the film (unfortunately only a small portion of the running time) with rapt attention, wondering about what MIGHT have been had Universal played it straight.

So, what did we learn today? Well, I think we have learned for the first time that even Universal could waste a good premise. Up until this point, the GOOD Universal films all had pretty good potential and the BAD ones were pretty much doomed from the start. Invisible Agent however, COULD have been good and its moments that are really good just tip us off further to the crappy slapstick. We’ve also learned that while German women spoke with German accents, SS officers didn’t. Another important lesson to be found here is that literally just anybody can parachute. Frank is never trained but just hops right into a chute and drops into Berlin. Finally, we’ve learned that patriotism and AMERICA freaking RULE and everything and everyone else will LOSE.

The special effects are back to their better state once again, so at least that’s something. Final Rating below. If you’d like to read more about what exactly my rating means as well as have access to a full index of my reviews, just CLICK HERE.

This hub is number sixteen in my “30 Hubs in 30 Days (PLUS THREE!) Challenge” where I will be reviewing essentially all the old Universal monster movies (the 30) as well as the very first, the very best and the very worst films to feature ensemble casts of ALL the monsters (PLUS THREE) over the period of just thirty (plus three) days. Who “challenged” me? Nobody…well, unless one can challenge themselves. In that case, I challenged me.