Now...you would be forgiven if you don’t remember the 1992 film, Memoirs of the Invisible Man. Directed by John Carpenter. It stars Chevy Chase and Darryl Hannah. Memoirs, follows Nick Halloway, a stock analyst at the top of the world who accidentally becomes invisible after falling asleep during a shareholder’s meeting at a science lab.
You know...as we all do.
Leading him to now keep one step ahead of the C I A agent, played by a scene-stealing, pre-Merlin, Sam Neil. All while trying to find a cure, and get his life back, before his diner’s card membership runs out. Developed as a vehicle for Chevy Chase, under the name the code name “A Cornelius Production" – which happens to be Chevy Chase's real first name. The project would go through 5 years, several rewrites, and a director before John Carpenter took up the mantle.
Bye Bye Man:
When we first meet the film’s main protagonist, Nick Halloway. He still living the privileged “Gordon Gecko” lifestyle of the 80s. He’s an orphan who’s never been married, likes strong drinks and risky bets. Nick is a man that has spent his entire life avoiding responsibility and connections to other people. That is…until he meets documentarian Alice Monroe played by Darryl Hannah. Within an hour of their first meeting, they’re making out in a bathroom and setting up the next romantic rendezvous. And yet, despite the seemly instant connection, you get a sense that for Nick this is something that happens all the time. And, even if she were special,
Alice would be in a long line of broken relationships. His future ex-wife you could say…
Most certainly that’s how things would have turned out..had it not been for a twist of fate that leaves Nick invisible. And by becoming invisible…Nick becomes non-existent unable to put on display all of his external achievements. Looking back - Memoirs can be read as the embodiment of the anxieties of the “Yuppie Generation” entering the 1990s.
Yuppie Nightmare:
Yes, the Young...Urban...Professional the embodiment of the American Dream on steroids. Spawned by economic expansion, corporate culture and fueled by ambition, greed, and excess, Yuppies forever aspired to move upward, onward and never look back. However, by 92’ most found themselves alienated in a new decade that was an increasingly technological world filled with grungy Gen-Xers who had come of age and rejected all that.
But, back Nick.
For him gone are the loft apartments, champagne lifestyle, athletic club dinners, and flash cars. Stripped away of all the hallmarks of his status in the world, Nick then, finds himself hunted by a government he himself never participated but, none the less expected to protect his entitlement. While promoting the film Chevy Chase stated:
"It’s not about the kind of situation where Claude Rains became invisible and went nuts, nor is it about a wacky guy who’s invisible and looks up girls' skirts throughout the movie," "It’s mostly about the peril of being invisible — not the fun or joy of it."
And that’s it...the perils of being invisible...when you’re used to privilege.
As you watch the film, I argue that you can feel Nick’s growing panic as he realizes that he no longer has any sort of relevance. This is felt most keenly in a scene in which Nick, while hiding out at a friend’s beach house, is forced to hear his so-called friends wistfully joke about his death. Played for laughs, the film stops, to open a window into what Nick’s life was before the accident. Namely, a life that was shallow, vapid and isolating. Sam Neil’s villainous agent Jenkins, even remarks that Nick was “invisible before the accident.”
Which brings me to another point…
Unlike, prior versions of The Invisible Man, where there was an exploration of: A good man’s descent into madness like in the original with Claude Rains or, a mad man without limits like in Hollow Man or the recent retelling with Elizabeth Moss, there’s no real character shift with Nick.
Man loses lifestyle.
Man wants lifestyle back.
I mean, I would too...that life was awesome.
But, it’s not like Nick becomes a better person by the end of the film. Hell, he even figures out a way to live “relatively” the same way he did before. Instead, this time living in a Swiss chateau, while trading stocks online. There is one silver lining however in his relationship with Alice. Though Nick remains basically the same person he was before, he is able to connect with one person. Going from completely self-absorbed and isolated to a married man with a baby on the way. Turning what could have been a throwaway hookup, full circle and into a touching romance.
Memoirs of the Invisible Man is a zany, sometimes touching, popcorn film of its time.
It didn’t become the star vehicle that either Chevy Chase or John Carpenter needed to launch them into the next decade. I mean, hasn’t sucked for either one of them over the last decades but it’s not the same. There were high hopes for this film at the beginning, as this was the teaming up of two of the 80s biggest powerhouses.
Chase for comedy and Carpenter for horror…
Except, Chevy wanted this to be a drama and was hoping that this project would be a bridge to less comedic roles. In an interview John Carpenter said:
“What we tried to do with Memoirs is to show his character going through changes.”
“Chevy didn’t want to just play someone like Clarke Griswald from the vacation movies who never changes.”
But, unfortunately, that’s exactly the opposite of what audiences wanted from Chase, or even got for that matter. Audiences wanted a zany comedy much in the same vein of the characters he was known for. Or at the very least societal horror from Carpenter. Instead, what they got was a metastatic film that asks:
What happens when a man on top of the world, suddenly...becomes...invisible?”