The Invisible Woman – 1941
I’m sorry to say, I was pretty disappointed in the effects from this film, and here’s why. They were just sloppy. There, I said it. I am just coming off of watching the 1940 nominee, The Invisible Man Returns, and I did my research, figuring out how the “invisible” effects were done without the use of blue-screen technology.
The trick with the way they did it relied on an actor dressed in a black velvet body suit. Then the camera would film the actor, and because the black sections of the film wouldn’t be exposed, a second exposure, or double exposure, would film a background that would show through the black velvet. As long as the actor didn’t move in front of anything that was supposed to be kept visible, the illusion was fantastic. But this movie just ignored the importance of that rule, and… I don’t know. They just hoped the audience wouldn’t notice the invisible woman’s black arm moving in front of the white skirt? Well, that’s what happened, and I noticed.
Add to that, the fact that the movie changed two significant things. First, the genre of the movie was changed from horror to screwball comedy. This, in itself, wouldn’t be a problem. But second, the story changed the method of invisibility. In The Invisible Man Returns, it was a chemical injection, through which we saw transformation happen in stages. We were shown different parts of the interior of the body as they became visible. Here we were just shown the woman’s feet. Then, as if they are raising a curtain, her ankles, and then her legs are exposed. Fortunately, the curtain stopped in the middle of her thighs, so as not to reveal any naughty bits before the disembodied legs ran off the screen. These two things just made the effect look a little cheap, especial when compared with the movie’s predecessor.
Aside from those glaring things, the effects were just fine. The fact that the film was a screwball comedy opened the door for a little more suspension of disbelief than serious films. Thus, when the invisible woman hits a man over the head with a shotgun so hard that the barrel of the weapon is literally bent in half, you have to give it a little leeway. A blow hard enough to do that would have crushed the man’s skull in. And I’d venture to say that no human being without the strength of Superman could have swung it that hard. So when the invisible woman begins bonking men on the head with a wooden mallet, I guess it was understandable why a single bonk was enough to render every witless victim instantly unconscious.
But never-mind that. The rest of the film’s effects were amusing enough. The array of “floating” objects that moved about by themselves was cute enough. And I suppose the flying cat that was then hurled across the room at the surprised butler was kind-of funny. But really, the somewhat sloppy effects of the movie seemed to be almost secondary to the silly, slapstick comedy, and the titillating idea of a naked woman running all over the place, causing all sorts of mischief. I don’t think it should have been nominated for Best Visual effects.