THE INVISIBLE DR. MABUSE On Blu-ray From Eureka

 

My title-by-title look at Eureka's MABUSE LIVES! Blu-ray box set continues with THE INVISIBLE DR. MABUSE (1962), the third film in the 1960s series made by the German company CCC, run by producer Artur Brauner. The original title of this film is DIE UNSICHTBAREN KRALLEN DES DR. MABUSE. 

It was Brauner himself that had the idea for this entry, a wild & wooly affair that has the diabolical doctor after a device that renders human beings invisible. Mabuse wants to use the device to--you guessed it--gain power and control by unleashing invisible killers on world leaders. Working against this plot is FBI agent Joe Como (Lex Barker), who also fought against the doctor in the series' previous entry, THE RETURN OF DR. MABUSE. Mabuse's plans are also complicated by the fact that the scientist who has invented the invisibility device is obsessed with an actress (Karin Dor) appearing in a Grand Guignol play. The actress winds up becoming the interest of nearly everyone in the story.

Just about everything but the kitchen sink winds up in this picture, with the disfigured scientist's unrequited love for a stage performer reminding the viewer of THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and Peter Lorre in MAD LOVE. There are also plenty of callbacks to the Universal Studios Invisible Man films of the 1930s and 40s, as Joe Como battles an unseen foe. 

Lex Barker makes a stalwart, if generic, main hero, but Karin Dor attracts the most attention as Liane Martin, an innocent woman who becomes ensnared in a bizarre tangle of weird forces. Dor was known as the "Queen of the Krimi" due to her numerous appearances in films of that genre, and to her marriage with this film's director, Harald Reinl. One wishes that more of the play in which Dor's character stars had been able to be shown (it might have been more interesting than the things going on in this movie). 

Mabuse series regular Werner Peters also returns, this time as a sinister clown that will immediately remind film geeks of one of the disguises used by Rudolf Klein-Rogge (the original Dr. Mabuse) in Fritz Lang's silent espionage epic SPIES. Producer Artur Brauner and director Harald Reinl fashioned THE INVISIBLE DR. MABUSE to be very much like one of the Edgar Wallace Krimis, so much so that at times one forgets that it is a Mabuse film. As for the title character, Wolfgang Preiss once again plays him--but the actor is also used in a way to totally deceive the audience. 

In the MABUSE LIVES! box set, THE INVISIBLE DR. MABUSE shares the same disc with THE RETURN OF DR. MABUSE. INVISIBLE is presented in a 1.66:1 aspect ratio, and the black & white picture quality is sharp and detailed. As with the other films in this set, both German and English voice tracks are provided, with English subtitles. 

Tim Lucas provides a six-minute intro for this film, and he states that the way Mabuse is used in this movie calls to mind the Fantomas character. He also points out that Harald Reinl as a director has not been given enough appreciation by film buffs. David Kalat also provides a new commentary, which he starts out by presenting his case that INVISIBLE is the most Edgar Wallace-like of the Mabuse series. Kalat also spends a lot of time going off on various tangents, such as how special effects have been presented in different eras of film, the German Western movies based on the works of Karl May, and a long anecdote about Jess Franco. An original German trailer for INVISIBLE is included, along with an American trailer which calls the film THE INVISIBLE HORROR and makes it seem like cheap drive-in material. 

THE INVISIBLE DR. MABUSE touches so many genres that it's hard to adequately classify it. But that's the fun of the Krimis--when you watch one of them you feel as if you're getting multiple movies at once.