| "So all these tapes are $3 each, eh?" I ask, staring at an entire wall groaning with the weight of unwanted VHS tapes. "Yep," says the video store guy, smiling cheerfully. "Help yourself." I check my watch. I’ve got about 20 minutes to search through about a dozen two-metre shelves crammed with movies, pick out the really rare or interesting ones, pay for them, and run next door in time to pick up my Chinese-food order. I can do this. I’m a pro.
Ten minutes later, I’m only about three shelves in and haven’t found anything that tickles my fancy yet. (Shop faster! Less picky! Go go go!) Then I spot something called The Revenge of Doctor X. Hmm. Didn’t Humphrey Bogart do a horror movie called The Return of Doctor X (1939)? Better check this out…
One glimpse at the video box makes it clear this isn’t a Bogart film. The box credits one Angelique Pettyjohn, an actress I vaguely remember being famous for appearing in both Star Trek and soft-core porn. Ummmm… what the hell! I grab Doctor X – along with slightly better known cult flicks The Baby (1973) and The Mack (1973) – and sprint out the door, just as my time runs out. Phew!
As it turns out, everything printed on the video box for The Revenge of Doctor X (1970) is wrong. The cover art is randomly selected and meaningless. The plot description (along with the cast) is from a completely different movie – The Mad Doctor of Blood Island (1968). That means Angelique’s not in this one, even though the (fake) opening credits continue to insist otherwise. Instead, much to my surprise and delight, I am now the proud owner of an Ed Wood film that I never knew existed.
Edward D. Wood Jr, for those who don’t know, is the most beloved "bad" filmmaker of all time. His masterpiece, Plan 9 From Outer Space (1959) received the Golden Turkey Award for Worst Film of all Time, with Wood honoured as worst director. His films aren’t just bad – they’re fascinating, passionate, hilarious and unique. His scripts are like nothing you’ve ever heard or read before – tangled masses of ridiculously misapplied verbiage that nevertheless manage to convey Wood’s heartfelt messages (and the thing is, he always has one). Wood didn’t direct The Revenge of Doctor X (a.k.a. Venus Flytrap, a.k.a. The Double Garden), but he wrote the screenplay.
Grumpy NASA rocket scientist Dr. Bragan (played by Clark Gable lookalike James Craig) blows his top once too often, and is advised to take a trip to Japan to chill out. On the way to the airport, he stops to dig up a Venus flytrap plant from the middle of a roadside snake farm. (Hey, if you’re flying to Japan, you want to bring a carnivorous plant with you – it’s just common sense.) At the airport, he meets his new assistant Noriko, and flirts with her. The uncredited Japanese actress who plays Noriko clearly doesn’t speak fluent English, and seems to be delivering her lines phonetically. (Don’t worry dear – Wood’s dialogue doesn’t make sense to anybody else, either.) For the rest of the movie, the bipolar Dr. Bragan alternates between sweetly courting Noriko and venting his rage at her. She puts up with his abuse and coos demurely when flattered.
The duo shack up in a bizarre greenhouse laboratory of some kind, where the good doctor prepares botanical experiments that he hopes will prove that mankind evolved from plants. (I thought he was supposed to work for NASA?) The place comes complete with a Japanese version of Igor, a grubby little man who lopes around like a hunchback, giggles maniacally and plays Castle Dracula-style mood music on the pipe organ. With the help of four topless bathing beauties (wayhey!) the scientists retrieve a giant underwater plant of some kind, and make a hybrid out of it and the flytrap. The resulting "plant" is obviously a man in a hilarious rubber costume, standing in a big flowerpot. We wait patiently for the monster plant to start walking around, while Dr. Bragan feeds the thing blood and small animals. Meanwhile, Igor keeps teasing the plant, poking it and then turning his back and laughing like it was the funniest thing in the world. (C’mon plant – get him! Argh… missed! Try again!)
It’s an absolutely insane film, perfect for Ed Wood fans. As far as I know, it’s only ever been available as this out-of-print Regal Video release, complete with misleading cover. |
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