Customer Reviews

The Wasp Woman - Attack of Giant Leeches

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Susan Cabot is The Wasp Woman, a fading beauty who runs a cosmetics firm and tries to recapture her youthful good looks with an experimental formula of wasp enzymes. She becomes younger and lovelier with each treatment, but the formula has unpleasant side effects--she turns into a wasp-like creature (a werewasp?) with a murderous bent. This early Roger Corman film was Cabot’s sixth and last role for the incredible movie-maker (he’s produced/directed more than 300 movies!) This movie was remade in 1995 for cable TV, and in the new version, the special effects were better but the story was pretty much the same.

Yvette Vickers has a starring role in Attack of the Giant Leeches, another early Corman epic. The leeches stalk the Florida Everglades, attacking unwary inhabitants and sucking out their bodily fluids. The special effects in this one are laughable. The leeches are guys wearing outfits with suckers stuck on, but the natural special effects of Ms. Vickers makes up for a lot!

This DVD is inexpensive, with few bonus features. There’s a preview of a coming attraction, Lady Frankenstein, trailers for the two features, short scene indexes, and a Popeye the Sailor cartoon. Image and sound quality are pretty good. Not bad for the money!

Without Roger Corman, classics like these would not exist! Wasp Woman is one of the best schlock-o-ramas ever filmed! Susan Cabot injects herself with "royal wasp jelly" serum in order to regain her youth. She looks beautiful, but is turned into a homicidal maniac in a silly looking "wasp" mask. Her "claws" are basically black, fuzzy gloves with what look like styrofoam nails glued on them. This only adds to the fun! "Attack Of The Giant Leeches" has it's own gooey charm. Giant leeches grab all the hillbillies they can carry, and store 'em in a secret underwater cave-lair. Yvette Vickers sizzles and fries up the screen every time she appears! I'd recommend this movie just to see her! She's married to a fat guy who catches her in the arms of his "good friend" Cal. The best scene is when chubby-hubby forces the two lovebirds into the local swamp at gunpoint. Pay no attention to the men in those hefty-bag leech costumes! Just watch Yvette and all will be well...

It was a real treat watching this DVD! I enjoyed the authentic drive-in setting, although they could have thrown in some refreshment stand ads that would have completed the experience. The only thing I found annoying was the starting of the movies on that animated drive-in screen. I could have done without that. The movie prints themselves are in decent shape, or at least par with other copies I have seen of these movies. The only other beef I have is the green tint of the wasp woman. For ten bucks I thought this was quite a steal, and I will definitely investigate other titles in this series, however good or bad they may be!

Ok, the price is right for two ace sci-fi b-movies. Well the video is alright, I'll even say good. But the audio is HORRIBLE. I don't think I'd buy this if I had it to do again. Which is a shame because the films are great for laughs.

I'm not going to try to analyze the merits of these films, like some reviewing predecessors. Quite simply, Madacy Enterainment has once again come up with a great double-bill of "the best of the worst", complete with cartoon and trailers. It's amusing that Allied Artists (Wasp Woman) and American-International (Leeches) are represented here, since they were rivals for years to get the drive-in crowd. The acting in both is abysmal, which is only right and proper. "Wasp Woman" was early Corman, and shows a bit of style, but try to overlook that and enjoy the trashiness of it all. I love it when the male lead in these films shows off manly chest-hair (Ken Clark in "Leeches"). He IS the hero, can anyone doubt it? What a guy! I've always liked Yvette Vickers (Leeches); too bad she did too many of these films to legitimize her career. Once again, Madacy included a Popeye cartoon without Olive Oyl. Pity. Lighten up! Give yourself a break from the intellectual. Life's too short not to indulge yourself in some trashy fun.

I bought this DVD based on the one previous review here and I have to say I'm disappointed still. In my opinion the prints used do not merit "pretty good" status. Maybe The Giant Leeches; certainly not The Wasp Woman. Compared to my taped-off-TV print, The Giant Leeches appears brighter at first, till you notice that it's only because the print is far too contrasty. The lighter areas of the picture don't look too bad, but the shadow detail is completely filled in. The detail of my VHS TV print is actually quite a bit better. The DVD print also shows the usual speckling and minor wear, but no major damage. I could almost live with this disc if the Wasp Woman print was as barely passable as The Giant Leeches, but it's actually far worse. Besides the usual wear and speckling, the print has this ugly greenish tint to it, besides being quite soft and also very contrasty. At times, areas of white "bloom," creating annoying visual artifacts. (I cued up my VHS copy, taped off TNT years ago, and it blew the DVD print away in every category.) Besides the lousy prints used, the final indignity is having the beginning of both features shrunk down inside a stupid cartoon graphic of a drive-in screen. How disrespectful of both the film and intended audience. The cynicism of some of these low-budget DVD producers seems to know no bounds. The other annoying aspect of this disc is that although it is set up to replicate the whole "two features, cartoons, trailers, etc." aspect of a drive-in show, I was unable to get the disc to play the whole program straight through (it stopped and returned to the menu right before the second feature) and it appears impossible to get the feature films to play from the beginning without their accompanying trailers playing first (or having to skip through them). All in all, a travesty of the potential of the medium and a waste of money, even at the low price. I have learned my lesson: avoid all Madacy discs like the plague until they get their act together. Even though I gave this only one star, from what I've read some Madacy DVDs are even worse! (Does anyone know if Elite's print of The Wasp Woman is any better?)

The prints used for this DVD are in fair to poor shape, the worse being THE WASP WOMAN. There are scratches and some jerkiness in the framing of the picture. Like another reviewer, I dislike the shrunken screen within a cartoon theater at the beginning of each feature. The trailors are also intrusive at the start of each film. The print used has a heavy green tint. I am unsure as to whether this is original or the result of a chemical breakdown in a poorly maintained copy.

THE WASP WOMAN is a typical story from the "Man Turns into Monster" genre, although in this case, the victim is a woman. An extract of the royal jelly from wasps restores youth. However, it has the reoccurring side-effect of turning the subject into a killer insect. While this a Roger Corman film, there is little in the way of his famous special effects or outfits. The costume is little more than a woman with a bug mask and hairy gloves. (The original cover art is deceptive, depicting a gigantic wasp body with a woman's head. She is holding a bare chested man and one has to wonder whether she means to kiss him or eat him. The wording is meant to tease, but is left totally unrealized in the film: "A Beautiful Woman By Day - A Lusting Queen Wasp By Night." There is no hint that she lusts for anything other than her own youthful beauty and the success of her company.)

The actor Anthony "Fred" Eisley is featured as the hero, although a weak one. If I recall correctly he used to star in Hawaii Five-O many years ago. He is still with us and working.

Many people do not know that there have been several remakes of this 1960 film. The first was the British release of METAMORPHOSIS with Bobbie Bresee in 1987 and again by its traditional title for Showtime cable in 1995, under the direction of James Wynorski.

>No blasphemous or vulgar words.
>Slight verbal sexual inuendo but no nudity or other sexual content.
>Plot violence but nothing graphic and no gore.

ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES is from the "Mutant Monster" genre. It is suggested that radiation from rocket testing may have caused the problem. A man armed with a rifle is killed by a mysterious creature in the swamp. The game-keeper decides to track it down, taking his defenseless girlfriend along in his boat. Does this make any sense? Later he wonders aloud, "Why weren't we attacked?" An Einstein he isn't! Local inhabitants have to alert him to the fact that the usual large population of gators is missing from the suspected area of the swamp. Why did the game-keeper not notice this, himself?

This is NOT a movie for little kids. If the game-keeper's girlfriend is a "good girl", the store owner's wife is a definite "bad girl". Played by Playboy Playmate, Yvette Vickers, she begins the film dressed immodestly, although comparable to a bikini outfit. Immodest gestures and attention to her legs are meant to titillate. Later it is revealed that she is having an adulterous relationship with one of her husbands so-called friends. Discovered by her husband, he chases them into the swamp where the leech monsters get them. Her husband is accused of murdering them and in his grief hangs himself in the jail. The monsters will get a few more victims before the end of the story.

>Somewhat harsh language, but no blasphemous or vulgar words.
>Adultery, passionate kissing, somewhat immodest dress, but no nudity.
>Plot violence but nothing graphic and no gore.

This film has gone by many titles, including ATTACK OF THE BLOOD LEECHES, THE GIANT LEECHES, and just plain LEECHES.

The Wasp Woman:

Maintaining that wasp waist

Janice Starlin (Susan Cabot) head of a cosmetics company was told the she needs to stay young to promote the product. What can she do? Enter garage scientist Eric Zinthrop (Michael Mark) with a dubious formula made from wasp royal jelly. He explains that "just a little dab will do you." She gets greedy and shoots up with the extra strong stuff. This gives her a BUZZ and can have biting consequences.
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Giant Gila Monster:

A huge slithery tongue

This is a picture of life before CGI. The contrived dialog is part of the mystique. You get to see hotrods and large lizards (every thing is bigger in Texas.) The blob it is not; but it is a necessary addition to any 50' collection.

A teenage boy and a teenage girl disappear together and the law is getting suspicious.

I want to ask the monster if teenagers taste like chicken?