For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

A 10-year old boy builds a robot, none other than Robbie the Robot (the studio spent a fortune building it for "Forbidden Planet" and wanted to use the robot again), who, at the boy's request, turns him invisible. The boy at first uses his powers for silly pranks, but later must use his power of invisibility to defeat a supercomputer gone bad (Skynet anyone?). "The Invisible Boy" is clearly aimed a children and is diverting enough of escapist fun, but getting to see Robbie the Robot is the real highlight of the film.

When it Came to B-Movies MGM Usually Didn't Have a Clue. Here is Another Example of the Haughty Studio Cashing in On the Popularity of Robby the Robot and Abandoning or Not Caring About Any of It.This is an Unintentionally Disturbing "Kid's" Movie Where the Child is Literally Beaten by His Father, Threatened to be Beaten by His Father Even More, Spanked by His Mother, and Threatened by the Supercomputer to be Put to Death "Slowly". This is All Qute Cringe-Worthy.The Movie Also Shifts Tone Half Way Through from a Light-Hearted "Having fun with my pal Robot" Story to a Kidnapping, Ultra Smart Computer Doing Brain Implants and Aspiring to Take Over the World.Robby the Robot, Halfway Through the Thing Turns from Friend to Foe and it is Imaginable that Kids who Saw This in the Fifties Went from Amused to Terrified as it Unfolded. It is Worth a Watch Just Because it is So Bizarre as it Turns Every Which Way and the Disjointment is "Ed Wood" Like the Way it is Handled. The Look of the Film is Shiny and Some of the Supercomputer Sets are Fifties Nifty. Overall, it is a Very Odd Movie and its Strangeness and the Bizarre Behavior by the Parents is Part of its Retro Appeal, and That was Certainly Not its Intention.

MGM sci-fi flick about a young boy and his robot friend trying to stop an evil supercomputer from taking over the world. There is some invisibility in this one but it seems like it was just tacked-on to justify the title. It's certainly not important to the plot. This has no connection with the earlier Invisible Man series from Universal, either. It has somewhat of a connection to the classic Forbidden Planet, which was the first movie with Robby the Robot. Here, it's said Robby was brought from the future via time travel so there's an implication (though never stated definitely) that it's the same character from the other film. This is more of a kiddie movie than serious science fiction. It goes on longer than necessary and offers little to impress. The cast is fine, although child actor Richard Eyer seems like a poor man's Jerry Mathers. The best thing about the movie (besides Robby, of course) are the old-school computers and whatnots. Silly but charming in its way. It's no Forbidden Planet, that's for sure.

This film is much better and much more interesting than the title would suggest, although the title does serve to underscore one of the rather subversive themes in this picture.To be sure, this is a B/W 1957 low budget scifi film, and shares the common traits of its peer group. And if those factors are negative in your aesthetic sense, you must also know much of the film occurs from the point of a view of a pre-adolescent 1957 boy.Yet amazingly, this is an imaginative and thoughtful genuine scifi script, with a pedigree from Cyril Hume, who wrote the classic 'Forbidden Planet.' The central science fiction theme is an artificial intelligence that goes rogue, and this is one of the earliest scifi films to approach this idea.There is also a strong sub-textual message that our eponymous hero is largely ignored by his self-absorbed parents, hence he is invisible in more ways than one. In an America freshly-painted with the myth of the nuclear family and parental supremacy, this film could be seen as a coded message of dissent.Most fantasy and scifi films of this period with child protagonists tend to be thoroughly juvenile in every respect. Whereas 'Invisible Boy', along with the classic 'Invaders From Mars', successfully inserts a kid into a genuinely interesting and perilous story that can be enjoyed by both young and old. Twenty-five years before Stephen Spielberg made 'ET'.Special note to fans of 'Forbidden Planet': Screenwriter Hume also successfully tied this film to Forbidden Planet in a very clever way.