The Invisible Ray

Doctor Janos Rukh has spent years in his Carpathian laboratory studying light arriving from space. An expedition to Africa is organised and there he finds a new element: a substance with extraordinary healing power, able even to reverse blindness. But it has affected him too; he kills every living thing he touches and glows in the dark. Seized by paranoia, Rukh believes his wife is unfaithful and turns his own poisoned body into a weapon. Lambert Hillyer's film is one of the entries in Universal's 1930s horror run that leans toward science fiction. The narrative takes the cost of scientific discovery rather than fear of a creature as its subject, and connects directly with the era's fear of radium. Boris Karloff plays Rukh and Bela Lugosi plays Doctor Benet, the scientist opposite him. It is one of the films the two made together. Who it's for: Viewers who like 1930s Universal horror, the Karloff and Lugosi pairing, and early science fiction. Who it's not for: The African sections are drawn in the colonial shapes of the period. The pace is also slow and the effects are simple.