Not sequels to the recent Leigh Whannel movie, we watched an invisible black and white double bill: The Invisible Man Returns / The Invisible Woman (1940).
Returns stars Vincent Price, a beloved owner of a coal mine. He is in prison for the murder of his brother. At the last minute, his friend, the Invisible Man's brother John Sutton, slips him the potion, allowing him to escape. Invisible Price flees naked to be with his betrothed, Nan Grey. Then he sets out to find the true murderer. But will he be able to before the invisibility drives him mad?
Chief suspects include Alan Napier (Alfred the butler) and Sir Cedric Hardwicke, while Cecil Kellaway plays the police detective looking for Price. We enjoyed this, although it is a little busy. Also, a disappointingly happy ending. Not much of a horror movie at all.
Woman is definitely not a horror movie - it's straight up comedy. John Howard is a playboy, spending vast sums of money to make women go away. He also supports the sciences, as in mad sciences. He pays John Barrymore to do unspecified research. But when his account Charles Ruggles tells him he is broke, he has to tell Barrymore that the experiments are over.
However, Barrymore has discovered the secret of invisibility, which will make Howard a fortune. They just need a human guinea pig. Virginia Bruce, recently unemployed model, answers the advert. However, as soon as she's invisible, she heads out to torment her old boss, Charles Lane.
Meanwhile, gangster Oscar Homolka and his thugs Shemp Howard, Ed Brophy, and Donald MacBride steal the invisibility machine. The effects have worn off for Bruce, but she discovers that alcohol, applied topically or ingested, brings it back. So it thugs vs. invisible drunk woman.
You might have noticed a pretty formidable lineup of character actors in this (as in the previous), but aside from Barrymore, they don't have much to do. Bruce is beautiful, but I'm not sure she's a great comedian. The writing is pretty scattershot, anyway. So this was a bit of a bagatelle. Not great but fun enough.
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