Product Details

• Actors: Phillip Barry, Susan Cabot, Lynn Cartwright, Roger Corman, Anthony Eisley
• Directors: Roger Corman
• Format: Black & White, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Good Times Video
• DVD Release Date: August 30, 2005
• Run Time: 73 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0009PLLMC
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #71,858 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "The Wasp Woman" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

THE WASP WOMAN A Beautiful Woman by Day—A Lusting Queen Wasp by Night! [ Roger Corman, king of the cult classics, produced and directed this low-budget fear-fest, and even makes an uncredited cameo appearance as a doctor in one of the hospital scenes. Susan Cabot (Sorority Girl) plays Janice Starlin, whose cosmetics company has started to lose sales, because its marketing relies on her own once-impressive but now aging beauty. The eccentric Eric Zinthrop (Michael Mark) develops an enzyme extract from royal wasp jelly, which rejuvenates Janice, with one tiny little side effect: it turns her into a monster! Written by frequent Corman collaborator Leo Gordon (The Terror), this co-stars Anthony (aka Fred) Eisley (Dracula Vs. Frankenstein) and Barboura Morris (A Bucket of Blood). Approximately 72 minutes Black and White

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Oh, Roger Corman, where is thy sting? Oh, here it is, February 17, 2003

By 

Daniel Jolley "darkgenius" (Shelby, North Carolina USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Wasp Woman [VHS] (VHS Tape)

I've got to hand it to Roger Corman for this one; Wasp Woman is a pretty darn good movie (albeit with vintage Corman-esque not so special effects). The film starts off with a whimper, giving us a boring look at bee farming before introducing us to Dr. Zinthrop, who is promptly fired for wasting his time experimenting with wasps. Then we are taken to the boardroom of Janice Starlin Enterprises, a cosmetics company facing lean times because the face that has always sold the product, that of Janice herself, is not as young as it used to be. Enter Dr. Zinthrop and his fantastic story of restoring youth with a wonder-working extract taken from queen wasps. After he turns two old rabbits into young bunnies before her eyes, Janice believes him and insists that she will be his first human test subject. The rest of the company bigshots are increasingly concerned by the secrecy around Zinthrop's work, but even they cannot deny the new youthful face of their leader (accomplished mainly by taking away her old maid glasses and having her smile more often). Unfortunately, Janice secretly injected herself with the experimental, much more concentrated extract in order to hasten the process, and poor Zinthrop gets run over by a car before he can warn her of its rather disturbing side effects. Thus, we are left with several Starling associates trying to find out what is really going on. They think Janice is in danger, but in fact they are the ones in danger. Janice's headaches are indicative of a much more significant problem; from time to time, she turns into a giant wasp who is less than civil to her underlings.

The whole wasp woman getup is pretty ridiculous-looking, but one can look past such silly special effects and enjoy the movie for the fun, B-movie classic it is. The acting is unusually good for a Corman movie, and Susan Cabot particularly shines as Janice Starling. I've seen a number of Roger Corman movies, and this 1960 offering is by far the best of the bunch as far as I am concerned.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars LOGO WARNING!!!!!, June 27, 2009

By 

larryj1 (AZ, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Wasp Woman (DVD)

All I can say is the 1-star is for the Good Times DVD. They have their logo throughout the film, thereby ruining it for the viewer and rendering the DVD useless.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful woman by day - a lusting queen wasp by night., February 21, 2004

By 

cookieman108 "cookieman108®" (Inside the jar...) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Wasp Woman (DVD)

From Roger Corman, one of the most prolific director/producers in Hollywood, comes The Wasp Woman (1960), a film that was most probably influenced by 1958's The Fly, with Vincent Price. Hey, if Hollywood can turn a man into a fly, why not turn a woman into a wasp? Well, no one ever accused Corman of originality.

The movie opens up with a scientist getting fired from a company the produces honey as he is doing some strange experimentation. Seems the Scientist, Eric Zinthrop, played by Michael Mark, has been exploring the notion of using royal jelly to create a rejuvenation formula. After getting fired, Zinthrop contacts Janice Starlin, played by Susan Cabot, the head of Starlin Cosmetics. Starlin Cosmetics is losing sales due to the fact that Ms. Starlin was the only spokesperson for the cosmetics, and now that she is aging, sales are falling off. After talking to Zinthrop and seeing his success on turning back time with various animals, she hires him on, sets him up in a lab, and they begin treatments on her. The process appears to be working, but Ms. Starlin becomes impatient, wanting more results quicker, so she secretly starts injecting herself with the formula. What happens? Take a guess...I mean, the movie is titled The Wasp Woman.

The acting wasn't bad, but we didn't even see the wasp woman until almost an hour into this rather talky feature. There are some bloody deaths, and the make up to create the wasp woman isn't all that bad, but the movie would have benefited from not making us wait so long in seeing the creature, filling up the 73 minute run time with nonsensical plot threads that don't develop.

Alpha Video provides an exceptionally poor print here, as the film has all kinds of blemishes and even drops out briefly at a couple of points. The picture appears washed out, and the audio is pretty poor. No special features here in this barebones release, not even a trailer, but for under ten bucks I wasn't expecting much. Now that I've experienced the quality of Alpha Video, I doubt I will buy any more of their releases. I would recommend someone interested in owning this movie on DVD to do a little research, as I have since found out a number of companies have released a version, some even on double bills with other movies. I will say the cover art on the Alpha Video release looks enticing, but, as with most things in life, you get what you pay for here.

Cookieman108