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Released by: Shout! Factory
Released on: 11/09/2010
Director: Various
Cast: Various
Year: Various
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The Movies:
Picking up where Rhino left off, Shout! Factory unleashes another four titles from their ongoing Mystery Science Theater boxed set line. For the few out there unaware of who or what the Mystery Science Theater thing is all about, basically, it was a long running show in which a recurring cast of characters - a space castaway and his robot pals - were forced to watch bad movies while doing time on a satellite. This simple premise basically allowed Joel Hodgsen or Mike Nelson (depending on how early or recent the episode in question may be), Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett (who have recently teamed up to pick up where they left off with their Rifftrax project) to crack wise about 'bad' movies. The series was on the air from 1988 through 1999 and it still has a loyal cult following to this day while it's various participants have gone on to other, similar projects like Cinematic Titanic and the aforementioned Rifftrax downloads.
This time around, the gang takes on the following four films:
DEVIL FISH:
Lamberto Bava's 1984 killer fish movie was obviously inspired by the success of Jaws and the countless other Italian knock offs that Spielberg's movie birthed. While it may not be the worst of the Jaws rip offs, it's definitely in the running.
Set out in the ocean, we see a series of boats destroyed by an unseen force. Dr. Stella Dickens (Valentine Monnier) is called in to investigate but the teeth marks on the wreckage don't match anything, which means only one thing - that it's some sort of undiscovered creature that's been causing all this chaos and that she and her team of crack scientists are obligated to do everything in their power to capture this creature alive.
What Dr. Dickens doesn't know is that the culprit is actually a genetically engineered fish that's been created by some other, meaner scientists to be the ultimate weapon and that this 'devil fish' can procreate asexually. That means that pretty soon there's going to be a whole lot of crazy, nasty fish wrecking boats and eating people all over the world's oceans.
Anyone with an affinity for the goofy Italian Jaws rip offs of the early eighties already knows what to expect from this one - bad acting, goofy effects, a ridiculous premise all made worse by horrible English language dubbing. Not particularly coherent or logical, Devil Fish is a fun movie, but it's bad enough that, yes, it definitely deserves the skewering that it gets here in this later-era episode. Euro-cult fans will appreciate seeing Dagmar Lassander and Gianni Garko pop up in this mid-eighties turdfest, though unfortunately the version shown here is (understandably, given the show's TV origins) the heavily cut version of the film missing quite a bit of bloodshed.
The film is better known as Monster Shark in some circles and was released uncut on DVD in Japan, but so far has not seen a domestic release on DVD outside of this MST3K version.
DEVIL DOLL:
The weakest entry in this otherwise very good and very funny set is Lindsey Shernoff's 1964 black and white thriller, Devil Doll, which stars Bryant Haliday as The Great Vorelli, a performer who works as a ventriloquist and hypnotist who uses a dummy dubbed Hugo to do his evil work. He's got a good thing going with his act where he hypnotizes audience members and then uses his abilities to make Hugo walk, talk and act like a creepy-ass living being.
A journalist/newspaper man (William Sylvester) becomes intrigued by the act and starts snooping around while Morelli takes a liking to his fiancé, the lovely Marianne (Yvonne Romain). It doesn't matter to Morelli that Marianne is engaged to be married, he isn't going to take no for an answer because she's got a pretty massive inheritance coming her way and he wants a piece of that. Hugo, however, might have a bigger part to play in all of this than even Morelli realizes.
The reason that this is the weakest entry in the set is because Devil Doll is actually a pretty good movie. Despite its obviously low budget, there are some really effective moments here and a whole lot of weird, creepy atmosphere to go around, particularly in the scenes that involve Hugo. There are moments that work better than others and these are the bits in the MST3K version that the commentators do their best to take advantage of, but for the most part they're struggling to come up with classic lines here and this is a picture that definitely plays better without the commentary (though we're not given that option).
There are two different versions of this film in circulation, a longer European cut and a shorter American cut. It's the shorter American cut that appears in this set.
BRIDE OF THE MONSTER:
Bride Of The Monster has the marked distinction of serving as Bela Lugosi's swan song (the footage in Plan 9 was added after he had passed on), and it's an interesting way for the former Dracula star to be remembered, even if it isn't necessarily a good one when compared to the films he made that are able to be taken seriously.
Here Lugosi plays a scientist named Dr. Eric Vornhoff. When two men out hunting in the marsh near his home get stranded, they knock on his door hoping to be let in despite the fact that they know of the rumors supposing that Vornhoff may have something to do with the swamp monster that prowls the area. Vornhoff refuses them hospitality and has his assistant Lobo (Tor Johnson) walk them off his land. Once they leave, back into the storm, one hunter is killed by a giant squid that lives in the swamp(!) and the other is taken care of by Lobo.
Meanwhile, Captain Robbins and Lieutenant Craig are investigating the string of disappearances that have been happening lately in the area. A nosey female reporter named Janet starts bugging the cops for answers and soon heads off on her own to find out whether the swamp monster is real or not. The cops, with some help from Professor Vladimir Strowski (a specialist in prehistoric beasts), set out to save the reporter and solve the mystery of the swamp monster once and for all. Unfortunately for our heroes, Dr. Vornhoff has other ideas for them - he wants to use them as guinea pigs in his atomic experiments!
Surprisingly coherent for an Ed Wood film, Bride Of The Monster is one of his more enjoyable efforts thanks for the wonderfully ham-fisted screen presence of Mr. Lugosi and plenty of screen time allotted to Tor Johnson. Highlighted by the greatest human vs. giant rubber squid battle ever captured on film, the effects are boneheaded, the script is horrible, and the acting is bad - but it all moves along fast enough and with enough enthusiasm that you can't help but want to go along for the ride.
Dopey, dopey, dopey, Bride Of The Monster is good fun regardless and as much as some of us may love Ed Wood's screwy sci-fi films, it's easy to see why the MST3K group would set their sights on this picture. It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense and it's horribly made despite some really obvious enthusiasm from all involved. You can't help but laugh at it, because you're not supposed to laugh with it.
ROBOT MONSTER:
Preceded by a couple of chapters of the Radar Men On The Moon serial, this film from 1953 was directed by Phil Tucker and tells the story of an alien robot monster named Ro-Man, essentially a guy in a giant monkey suit with a scuba helmet on, who has been sent to Earth to scout out the planet which will soon be the subject of an alien invasion. He shows up and lays waste to everyone but one family - the father, a professor, (John Mylong), the mother (Selena Royle), the scientist daughter, Alice (Claudia Barrett), her boyfriend Roy (George Nader) and her two younger siblings, Johnny (Gregory Moffat) and Carla (Pamela Paulson).
Things are going well for Ro-Man until, when he finds the survivors, he soon falls in love with one of the female survivors, which obviously isn't cool with The Great One, Ro-Man's boss.
Completely ridiculous in every possible way, shape and form, Robot Monster is prime MST3K material from start to finish. It's also a very easy target. This makes for a lot of rapid fire jokes as the guys have no shortage of material here to work off of - from the costumes to the wooden acting to the very premise of the story itself. The very fact that Ro-Man himself tends to speak out loud about his feelings of love is comedic gold all on its own without the MST3K commentary, but here their quick wits and penchant for jobs is easily appreciated. The film is quite simply so utterly and completely horrible that they're really not taking anything away from it by lambasting the material as they do here.
Video/Audio/Extras:
The fullframe interlaced transfers that grace all four films in this set won't blow you away but they're watchable enough particularly when taken in the intended context. You will see the MST3K silhouettes in front of the screen so purists take note, and the transfers are taken from often times edited down old TV masters so those expecting the movies to appear here as they were originally intended will be disappointed. That said, they look as good here as they did on TV when they first aired and pristine video quality isn't really the point here. Are the transfers great? Nope, but they don't need to be.
The commentary comes through nice and clear, there are no problems understanding the participants and they've balanced nicely against the audio from the movie itself. As far as the quality of that part is concerned, it's on par with the transfer. It's not great, in fact, there are times where it sounds quite shrill. It gets the job done, I suppose, but it's nothing impressive.
The extras are spread out across the four discs in the set but there's some good stuff here. Devil Fish includes the more impressive featurette in the set which is MST3K: Origins And Beyond: CONvergence 2009 Panel which is a convention panel with Joel, Frank and Mary Jo. There's a lot of good humor here as they basically deliver a Q&A about the show.
Bride Of The Monster includes a featurette called Citizen Wood: Making The Bride, Unmaking The Legend which covers the origins of the picture and on Ed Wood as well as second featurette entitled Inventing The Invention Exchange which covers the origins of the show in Joel's words by way of a lengthy interview with him.
Devil Doll includes a featurette entitled The Puppet Master: Richard Gordon On Devil Doll where Gordon talks about the film and what made it what it is, while Robot Monster includes a new introduction from J. Elvis Weinstein and an amusing bit called Larry Blamire Geeks Out.
Inside the packaging along with the discs (packed in slimline cases) you'll find some neat mini posters. In addition to that, the limited edition release comes with a way too cool Gypsy toy. Each disc also includes the original trailer for its feature. All in all, a pretty good selection of bonus features can be found in this set.
The Final Word:
Shout! Factory continues to excel with their MST3K releases, loading them up with extras and collectibles and providing a nice selection of material throughout their releases. This set finds three great episodes complimented by one not so great episode but makes up for that with a lot of really good bonus features and that way too cool Gypsy figurine.