BUCKET LIST UPDATE No. 174: Watch “The Incredible Shrinking Man” (1957)

“The Incredible Shrinking Man” is a movie I’ve wanted to watch ever since I read Stephen King’s 1981 book, “Danse Macabre.” In that nonfiction book, King talks about how he was heavily influenced by classic science fiction, fantasy and horror movies from the 1950s and 1960s. In the back of that book, he included an appendix called “The Films,” which was basically a list of King’s favorite fantasy and horror movies.

On that list of 100 or so movies, was 1957’s “The Incredible Shrinking Man.” Since reading “Danse Macabre,” I’ve seen that movie listed on a number of other best-of lists, including Fangoria magazine’s list of “300 Best Horror Films.” The Library of Congress also placed it on the National Film Registry in 2009.

On Saturday, thanks to NetFlix, I finally scratched this movie off my official “bucket list” when I watched it from start to finish for the first time. About half way through it, I realized that I’d seen portions of this old, black-and-white movie before, but I’m sure that I’d never seen the entire thing.

For those of you unfamiliar with “The Incredible Shrinking Man,” it’s about a man named Scott Carey who is accidentally sprayed with a large amount of insecticide and then is exposed to a massive amount of radiation while on a boating trip. The combination sets off a strange chain reaction: He begins to shrink a little every day.

Carey starts out as a normal-sized man, but as the movie progresses, he becomes smaller and smaller. He eventually ends up living in a dollhouse, battling the family cat and fighting for his life against a basement spider. This movie is full of action and is easy to get into. I now understand why it’s considered a classic and why Stephen King liked it so much.

Directed by Jack Arnold, this movie featured Grant Williams in the lead role of Scott Carey. Randy Stuart played his wife, Louise, and Paul Langton played his brother, Charlie. Other cast members included Raymond Bailey, Billy Curtis, Diana Darrin, April Kent, Helene Marshall, Frank J. Scannell and William Schallert.

I was especially interested to learn that this movie was based on a novel called “The Shrinking Man” by Richard Matheson, who also wrote the screenplay for the movie. Matheson is most famous for his horror novel, “I Am Legend.” “The Shrinking Man” was published in 1956 by Gold Medal Books. Now that I’ve seen the movie, I’m thinking about adding Matheson’s original novel to my “bucket list” next year.

If you’ve never seen “The Incredible Shrinking Man,” don’t sweat it. It’s rerun on television from time to time, especially around Halloween. I believe that I saw a portion of it last October during a horror movie marathon on AMC.

In the end, how many of you have watched “The Incredible Shrinking Man”? How many of you have read the original novel? What did you think about them? Let us know in the comments section below.