Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man

Bud Abbot and Lou Costello were an amazing comic team who endeared themselves to their fans with the kind of humor they projected; theirs was the kind of good fun with a lot of sight gags that made them one of the favorite duo in the movies for quite a while.

Universal, their studio, decided to showcased them in a series of movies that involved the "monsters" in its roster. This film is not one of those, but because of the usage of the amazing visual effects employed in using the visual effects in the "Invisible Man", it became a winner from the start.

This was one of the best Abbot and Costello's best movies. Both do excellent work under the direction of Charles Lamont. Arthur Franz, who is not "seen" enough is good as Tommy, the man accused of a crime he didn't commit. Sheldon Leonard is one of the gangsters that are manipulating the boxing matches. Nancy Guild and Adele Jergens are welcome additions to the movie.

Best of all are the boxing scenes involving Lou Costello as the amazing new boxer, Lou, "The Looper", who goes to beat Rocky, his better equipped opponent with a little help of his invisible friend.

In "Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man", detectives Bud Alexander (Bud Abbott) and Lou Francis (Lou Costello) have to protect a man framed for murder. This becomes proportionally easier once the man gives himself an invisibility serum. Some of the best scenes are when Lou watches him disappear, when a cop sees (or, rather, doesn't see) the man driving a car, and even a scene where Lou accidentally puts a bunch of people to sleep. The end scene is also a shocker.

These movies sometimes seem like they were just excuses for everyone to goof off. If so, then they did well. This one was also helped by the fact that it didn't have any songs, which sometimes weakened A & C's movies. Really funny.

I guess that I'll have to see this again, now that I know that Fred Mertz appeared in it.

Our intrepid bumbling duo deliver the goods in one of the better offerings on their considerable CV. Here they are freshly qualified Private Investigators thrust into a murder investigation with an invisible man. That alone should tell you that the fun flows at a very decent clip, so with that I just need to say that some of the sequences here are comedy gold. Like a scene at a restaurant that is excellent, or Costello pretending to work the ball in the gym, and a final reel of a boxing match that really gets the laughter flowing. Watching these guys act as if with a real invisible man is wonderful, and of course the effects team also deserve praise for doing such a damn fine job with the invisible man of the piece.

Not quite as good as...Meet Frankenstein, but it's darn near close. 8/10

could possibly be the second best movie a&c made besides frankenstein

To me, this is arguably the best of the "A&C Meet…" series. The boys get mixed up with a prizefighter accused of murder who escapes the cops and gangsters by turning invisible with the help of an experimental serum. Naturally, this leads to an array of amusing hijinks.

The comic potential here is greater than in other A&C monster entries (…Meet Frankenstein; … Meet the Mummy; etc.) because the menace here has the power of invisibility. That means the menace can challenge the boys in public without the public knowing it. On the other hand, the other monsters can't mix in public without being seen which narrows the comic potential to haunted houses or other non-public spaces.

For example, take the punching bag scene. It looks like Lou (Costello) has lightning speed rocking the bag when in reality it's the invisible boxer Tommy (Franz) who's doing it. There're a number of set-ups like this where the public is astonished by Lou's apparent powers, while actor Costello milks the comic potential.

That's not to say the other monster entries are not funny to varying degrees. But the monsters are restricted in these movies to scaring everyone in over-the-top fashion, whereas being invisible greatly expands the possibilities, such as the nightclub scene with the poor flummoxed waiter (Syd Saylor) who can't figure out who's doing what.

Anyway, the movie's consistently amusing and inventive. However, I wish we saw more of that great flashy blonde Adele Jergens (Marsden) and that great phony gangster Sheldon Leonard (Morgan). Seeing them together here resembles a match made in some cheap nightclub heaven. All in all, this is one of my A&C favorites among their many comedies.