Bud Abbott Lou Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951)

Two bumbling private eyes help a man wrongly accused of murder who has become invisible to help clear his name.

Director:

Charles Lamont

Writers:

Hugh Wedlock Jr. (story), Howard Snyder (story)

Stars:

Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Nancy Guild

1 nomination.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Bud Abbott	...	Bud Alexander
Lou Costello	...	Lou Francis
Nancy Guild	...	Helen Gray
Arthur Franz	...	Tommy Nelson
Adele Jergens	...	Boots Marsden
Sheldon Leonard	...	Morgan
William Frawley	...	Detective Roberts
Gavin Muir	...	Dr. Philip Gray
Sam Balter	...	Radio Announcer
John Daheim	...	Rocky Hanlon (as John Day)

Storyline

Boxer Tommy Nelson is accused of killing his manager. While detectives Bud and Lou investigate they come across an invisibility formula with which Tommy injects himself rather than face the police. This sparks an idea for trapping gangster Morgan by having Lou fight champ Rocky Hanlon, with Tommy's invisible help.

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Plot Keywords:

femme fatale | damsel in distress | deception | fight referee | police detective | 

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Taglines:

You'll shiver... You'll shudder... You'll shout with laughter!

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Genres:

Comedy | Horror | Sci-Fi | Sport

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Certificate:

Passed

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

7 March 1951 (USA)

Also Known As:

Meet the Invisible Man

Filming Locations:

Universal Studios - 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$627,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal International Pictures (UI)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

82 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This was originally intended to be a straight film in the Invisible Man series. After the huge grosses from Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), the script was rewritten to make it another thrill comedy with Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. As it happened, Abbott and Costello met an invisible man in the earlier film, too, but it was a different character.

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Goofs

The boxer, Tommy Nelson, is invisible and in order to stay this way he must not wear ANY clothes. This would include shoes. And yet when he walks across the mat in the boxing gym his footprints are very apparent, but as if he he wearing shoes and not bare feet.

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Quotes

Bud Alexander: [grabbed by the invisible man] Oh no! It's Tommy Nelson, Lou, he's here!
[grabs the air]
Bud Alexander: I touched him!
[gets slapped]
Lou Francis: I think he touched you back.

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Connections

Follows The Invisible Man Returns (1940)

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Soundtracks

Rock-a-bye Baby
(uncredited)
Music by Effie I. Canning

User Reviews

One Way of Looking at the "A&C Meet..." Series

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.