THE AMAZING TRANSPARENT MAN
(1960; d. Edgar G. Ulmer, w. Jack Lewis)

Camera w/draws from siren horn during prison break: something has escaped into consciousness, armed robber Joey Faust (plebeian ambition + intersection of earthy + intellectual, pulpy + sophisto; cf dir’s earlier low-bud Hamlet adaptation, Strange Illusion) sprung in order to help rogue spy General Kenner (prodigal from military-industrial [psychological] "complex," calling forth agent to inflate self till he – literally – explodes, whose globetrotting history suggests the all-encompassing Self) steal fissionable "X-13" from government (potent material semen, GK Prometheus stealing fire from gods + Oedipus in covetous revolt against authority) in order to create invisible army (negating own military self [title pointing up "transparency" of such ambition] + the unconscious threatening to subsume the physical world).

Getaway car driven by moll-ish Laura (woman/anima men’s vehicle to liberation from militaristic hubris via redemptive self-annihilation, illustrated 1st figuratively [invisibility] then literally [immolation]), who bypasses roadblock (dream-censor "Keeper o/t Peace" protecting undisturbed sleep) by passing Faust off as drunk hubby (in tux: making threatening material palatable by cloaking it in classical narrative), arriving at outskirts ranch (dream theater), where told Kenner’s scheme (mind's increasing cognition of psychic issue) + intro’d to Dr Ulof upstairs (senex [wise old man archetype JF’s inner wisdom] + higher consciousness [delivering film’s punchline moral challenge to viewer] conducting experiment [construction of dream in – upstairs – mental lab]; cf last-name similarity to dir), whose daughter Maria Gen Kenner has locked in adjacent room (anima repressed while destructive/anti-nature animus plays out foolish plot, she mute behind door: invisible [idea, not reality]).

Joey submits to transparency treatment (becoming nonmaterial psychic agent; cf similarly permeable previous-yr 4D Man) + does Kenner’s dirty work, then plots proscribed bank heist w/ Laura (oedipal infraction) under influence of X-13 (testosteronal hubris enhancer), during which he turns visible (real nature of endeavor exposed: K’s ambition [+ middleaged bachelor Joey’s desire for "freedom"] simple human greed/self-interest); returns to free Dr + now-corporeal Maria (personal revelation putting "face" on anima, her emergence developing prominence of wmn/fem pwr in world affairs) + lock up K (repressing self-interest).

Told by Ulof his time running out (clock ticking on covetous, violent animus) about same time scientist Kenner figures out to shoot off lock, Faust heads back w/ Laura to finish him off (she again vehicle/companion to liberation via self-annihilation), where she shot (loss of fem counterpart [unusually middle-aged wmn in trim film devoid of romance]); grapple w/ K brings Kiss Me Deadly-style A-bomb explosion of house (dead 3 inside paralleling escaped 3 outside [2 U’s + guard Julian]: deliverance of cleansed trinity of J-body, U-mind + M-soul), Ulof s "What wd you have done?" to audience similar elder Euro director at tail end of career (he also invisible/unheralded: his Fustian deal w/ Hollywood Mephisto) toiling for venal K as for sim’y isolated Poverty Row studios for sake of own real dtr, Arianné.