The Incredible Mr. Limpet

One of the movies that was about to expire on the Watch TCM app was The Incredible Mr. Limpet. Since I had never blogged about it here before, I decided to watch it so that I could do a post about it here.

Don Knotts plays Henry Limpet, although we only first see him in a photograph. That photo is in the archives of the Pentagon in the present day (well, 1964 when the movie was released) because the whole Henry Limpet case is top secret dating back to World War II. Now, however, thanks to the help of a flashback, we're able to learn the story of Henry Limpet....

It's the days just before World War II, and Henry Limpet is a mild-mannered man who seems more insterested in fish than anything else, even though he was able to pick up a wife Bessie (Carole Cook) somehow along the way. She's the sort of long-suffering wife, feeling herself playing second fiddle to all the fish that Henry keeps, and his feelings that fish must have a much better life than humans do. It's so bad that Henry's best friend, US Navy sailor George Stickel (Jack Weston) can see it and takes an interest in Bessie.

Everybody knows there's about to be a war on, and indeed the movie seems to indicate at first that the US is already at war although we see a newspaper headline about Pearl Harbor later in the movie. In any case, this is more plot exposition to point out that Henry can't serve in the navy even though he wanted to, thanks to his extreme nearsightedness that requires him to wear thick eyeglasses that make him look even more like a dork than you'd think if you think of the stereotype of Don Knotts as Barney Fife or from later seasons of Three's Company. Those glasses are going to become a plot point, although I'm getting ahead of myself a bit.

The Limpets and Stickel spend a day out on the town at Coney Island together, but tragedy strikes when Henry falls off the pier into the ocean. It's a tragedy for Bessie and George as Henry is never seen again. Surprisingly, however, it's not much of a tragedy for Henry. He has such a misperception about the life of a fish that he's practially taken to wishing he could be a fish himself. And when he falls off the pier, something magical happens, in that Limpet doesn't drown, but gets turned into a fish, with all following scenes of him being animated (and of course Knotts providing the voice of Mr. Limpet).

Limpet first runs into Crusty the Crab (Paul Frees), and then is met by a female fish who has no comprehension of a lot of the human things that Limpet talks about. She doesn't even understand the concept of a name, but is given the name Ladyfish (voiced by Elizabeth MacRae) by Limpet. As for Henry, in addition to having been turned into a fish, he's also been given a hellacious roar that can be useful in scaring away anything that would be scared by such a roar, or drawing attention from those whose attention he'd like.

And then Pearl Harbor happens. Mr. Limpet is still in the Atlantic, but the war is going on there as well with German U-boats attacking Allied shipping convoys crossing the Atlantic. Henry finally sees a way that he could be of use to the military. He can swim underwater and spot all the German submarines, which the Americans could then fire upon. Of course, there's a bit of a problem, which is how is he going to inform the Americans of all this? He tries, and understandably the naval authorities wonder what the hell is going on. Henry's memories of his best friend George, now in the navy, come in quite useful here....

The Incredible Mr. Limpet is an odd little movie, but one that actually works surprisingly well as light entertainment. Because of the animation it's easy enough to see why one would want to show it to kids. But there's also a lot grown-up going on. Not only are there the live-action scenes that might be a bit slow going for kids, especially because it takes a good half hour or so before we get to the animation. There's also some adult humor that might go over kids' heads, especially when it comes to Ladyfish's sex drive.

All in all, The Incredible Mr. Limpet is a fun enough movie even if it has some flaws, and is definitely worth a watch.