The Wild Women of Wongo (The Film Crew)

Film Year:  1958
Genre:  Porno without the nudity or sex (that's seriously the closest I can get)
Director:  James L. Wolcott
Starring:  Jean Hawkshaw, Mary Ann Webb, Cande Gerrard, Adrienne Bourbeau

The Movie

Mother nature plays a practical joke on mankind by placing an island where beautiful women of the Wongo village marry men are thuggish brutes while a village on the opposite island called Goona hosts handsome men who marry women who are hideous hags.  A man of Goona travel to Wongo to seek assistance in fighting off ape-men, but he find himselve smitten with the Wongo women.  The men of Wongo reject Goona's offer and chase him off, but the women of Wongo come to his aid.  The Wongo men sentence the women into the jungle until their god, a crocodile, claims one of them as a sacrifice, but the woman find themselves on a journey to Goona to meet more men that are to their liking.

And the moral of the story is pretty people belong with pretty people and ugly people belong with ugly people.  And remember beauty is only skin deep, AND how hideous you are determines who you are on the inside as well!

This movie is such a strange little find.  It's a weird 1950's anomaly that's seemingly made by people who have no experience making a film but really want to tell this pointless story for some reason.  The movie is poorly made, poorly acted, has almost no production value, and mostly sells itself on seeing women in leather bikinis.  But its strange sense of morality elevates it to a different level of awful film-making, where the movie basically tells us that beautiful people are good, smart, and resourceful while unattractive people are awful, mean, and dimwitted.  It's certainly...different than the normal lesson, that's for sure.  The winking at the end implies that it may have been a comedy or a parody of some sort, but it's not really that funny.  Maybe this whole thing was some strange meta experiment, by mocking bad movies by being a bad movie?

Wongo is a movie that really defies description.  It needs to be seen/endured to be believed.  It's probably the worst movie of The Film Crew's brief catalog, and considering how bad Hollywood After Dark is that's saying something.  Hollywood After Dark at least resembled an actual movie, while Wild Women of Wongo feels like exploitation dreck without the exploitation.

The Riff

The Film Crew have their work cut out for them this time, with such a bizarre film that has no idea what it's doing.  Wongo seems to be about sex without ever actually admitting it to itself or portraying any, so naturally Mike, Kevin, and Bill latch onto this aspect and don't let go.  Sometime they push the allusions of the film just a bit further and make it blunt.  These weird feelings the women have for these handsome strangers is more or less portrayed as 50's "squishiness" while guys bring out the film's inner pervert and unleash the fact that these girls are just really horny and it's a feeling they're not familiar with.  This entry of The Film Crew isn't all that dissimilar to MST's Horrors of Spider Island where they squeeze a sexual subtext for all it's worth.  The difference is that Wongo plays up innocence more and isn't as in-your-face with is sex-minded nature as Spider Island was, which makes dirtying it up a bit more fun.

The host segments are a bit casual this time around.  I don't think they're bad, they just exist and don't really service this show as a whole.  We see the Crew complain about a non-stop air conditioner as they freeze nearly to death and Kevin tries to find Wongo on a map of fantasy locations during the Lunch Break.  The best segment is the final one which has Mike, Kevin, and Bill asking a computer who their ideal mates are.

Wild Women of Wongo is the best remembered Film Crew episode, and probably with good reason.  It's the only one that went above and beyond the standard that their few recorded episodes set.  It has a memorably bad movie and riffing that excels in mocking it.  While the host segments could stand to be better, this stands as the must see of this tiny little riffing series that never took off.

Classic

The DVD

Like all Film Crew releases, Wild Women of Wongo was filmed in 2005 but shelved until 2007 when Shout Factory purchased and released them to DVD.  Picture was fair, with the host segments presented in the show's normal non-animorphic widescreen format, while the film itself was in full screen.  Audio was solid, though the film itself is a bit drained.  There are two bonus parodies of the film.  The first mocks the Priestess of the film who shouts "DANCE!" forcing Mike, Kevin, and Bill to break out into a dance.  The second is a parody of the winking ending, where Bill forgets how to wink.

Basic Job Skills: Dealing With Customers (Rifftrax Shorts)

Rifftrax Year:  2011
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

There's probably a good percentage of people who read this who have worked in retail before, whether to make extra cash in high school or something you fell into because Plan A never worked out (and if retail was your Plan A...you have my condolences).  But to deal with the various customer types out there, there's this dandy short, Basic Job Skills:  Dealing With Customers.  Here we have a list of ways to best help the various different customers and adapt to their needs.

To be honest, a lot of this is basic common sense and not that helpful.  In fact the short is so basic in order to be shown to employees of many different stores and store types as well, so if you're expecting any specific ways of handling scenarios specific to your own job, you're out of luck.  Customer service might take some getting used to for each individual employee, but I don't imagine this short ever made it any easier for them.

Having watched a fair amount of these trainee videos in my time, I was actually hoping for something more incident based with laughable acting in this short, and instead it's mostly narration and talking heads.  I would have thought digging out something for the former type would have made a better riffing selection, so to that extent this short was a bit of a disappointment for me.  That's not to say it's bad though.

Customer service is definitely something that can be mocked quite strongly, taking aim at both sides of the counter.  Mike, Kevin, and Bill are certainly up for it, riffing on both associate and consumer with a fair amount of ease bringing about narration add-ons, incompetent employees, and dimwitted customers.  I enjoyed seeing this familiar environment goofed on by these three comedians I respected.  It's not a laugh riot, but the good material is worth staying for.

Thumbs Up

👍

Blood of the Vampires (Cinematic Titanic)

Film Year:  1966
Genre:  Horror
Director:  Gerardo de Leon
Starring:  Amalia Fuentes, Romeo Vasquez, Eddie Garcia
CT Number:  7

The Movie

Imagine Days of Our Lives in 19th century Mexico.  Played by Filipinos.  With vampires.  And blackface.  Yes you read that right, us gringos aren't the only ones who can pull a Robert Downey Jr.!

"What do you mean 'You People?'"

Initially titled Whisper to the Wind, Blood of the Vampires is fairly drama focused for a vampire movie.  I think one could make the argument that the drama is more successful than your average Twilight movie, though that's nothing to write home about.  This story features a family discovering that their father keeps their vampiric mother trapped in the dungeon.  Their son is bitten by her and he begins draining the entire village of their blood.

There's lots of talk in this monster movie, often in the discussion of implications of vampirism's impact on one's personal life.  Yes, being a blood-sucking demon is bad enough, but so help me if it ruins our wedding!  To be honest, this emotional take on monster filmmaking isn't entirely uninteresting, but if one comes for the horror chances are one won't stay for the angst.  The production that's somewhat removed from the culture it's portraying doesn't quite help either.

And blackface.

The film is stylish and fairly well filmed.  It's possible this could have been a good film with certain other resources at their disposal.  Unfortunately it winds up just being a trashy bargain bin film that you might find at the dollar store.

The Riff

Cinematic Titanic puts the "nanotated disc" into the Time Tube for the final time in this last entry in their first wave.  Being their last studio release, let's make it count.

"Step aside, science!  This is a job for superstition!"

Blood of the Vampires is talkier than most riffed movies should probably be.  Sure it's a monster movie, but the drama is a non-stop roller-coaster while the horror just becomes a minor inconvenience that interrupts it.  I can see why this atypical film would be appealing to the Titans and why they feel it could be a good fit, though it feels like there isn't much room for them to work.  They give it a solid effort, though it's not quite a fulfilling riff experience.  The most that can be said is that the riffs on the blackfaced servants are usually quite funny.  The rest of the show is a constant stream of smiles with the occasional chuckle (my favorite being J. Elvis's Johnny Cash impression).  It's worth watching for the strongest moments, but it's hard to fully recommend it.

The sole host segment, and final host segment of Cinematic Titanic I might add, involves J. Elvis passing out drinks to help everyone get through the movie.  The majority of the segment is about Frank breaking sobriety to take one, though I think the biggest laugh goes to Mary Jo, who refuses one before someone points out that the film is only halfway over.  "Give me that!"  There is also an intro about how somehow the three Godfather movies got mixed up in the archive, causing Frank to exclaim surprise at there being good movies to be accessed.  To that I respond have you SEEN Godfather III? 

Blood of the Vampires was the final Cinematic Titanic release done in the studio format before the decision was made to focus primarily on live shows and record those for DVD release.  And while this riff is fair at best and the Live shows are fun, I feel something was lost by abandoning the format.  The format of these first seven entries in the Cinematic Titanic lineup are charming and fun, and I wish we could have had more.  This one ends this run on a bit of a whimper, though there are strong laughs at several points.

Average

The DVD

Like all Cinematic Titanic releases, Blood of the Vampires was initially released through their now defunct website.  Picture was good, even if the film was pixelated, and audio was great.  There were no special features.  It's currently available from Shout Factory in their Complete Collection set, where it shares a disc with the first Live show, East Meets Watts.

A Boy of Mexico: Juan and His Donkey (Rifftrax Shorts)

Rifftrax Year:  2011
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

"Come son, stereotypes need reinforcing."

Let's teach children about Mexico.  What does everybody have in Mexico?  Why donkeys, of course!

But A Boy of Mexico:  Juan and His Donkey doesn't have a whole lot of Juan's donkey in it.  This is the story of Juan, a boy who is traveling with his father and donkey to gather wood when they discover a man by the side of the road who has ran out of gas.  Deciding it's best to send a child off on his own to save the day, Juan's father sends him to fetch gas in the nearest down.  Juan's learns to keep his mind on the task at hand and helping others is a good thing that results in money.

There are a few points of stereotype in A Boy of Mexico, though I don't think they overwhelm the short itself.  It feels like the production was done in an attempt to create a link between our culture and Mexico's, showing children that Mexican children aren't so different.  At the same time it provides a moral lesson about compassion and helping others.  There is also a lesson of spending money the moment you earn it.

I'd say the short is harmless, but Mike, Kevin, and Bill set out to lampoon it anyway.  And I'm quite thankful that they did, because their commentary is quite hilarious.  Targets include predictable bits of stereotype, while they add stereotypes of their own, up to and including implying that the broken down man is a member of the drug cartel.  I quite like the riffs on Juan here, which portray him as somewhat clueless with a knack for just wandering around.  Paired with a short about a focused task, these riffs are gold.

The short isn't quite as offensive as it sounds, it's cute and simple.  Rifftrax spices it up into a must-see.  Pick this one up.  It's quite funny.

Thumbs Up

👍

201-Rocketship X-M

Film Year:  1950
Genre:  Science Fiction
Director:  Kurt Neumann
Starring:  Lloyd Bridges, Osa Madsen, John Emery, Noah Beery Jr., Hugh O'Brien, Morris Ankrum
MST Season:  2

The Movie

So a bunch of astronauts fly to the moon and wind up on Mars.  A mix-up only topped by Abbot and Costello winding up on Venus in a movie called Abbot and Costello Go to Mars!  But that's the premise in a nutshell for this early outer space sci-fi, which sees a group of scientists overshooting their destination and winding up further than they could have dreamed.  They land on Mars, go exploring, and are chased off by a native with a rock.  They decide this sucks, head home, crash, and die.  The end.

Hastily made in an attempt to ride the hype coattails of the much more expensive Destination Moon, this space travel yarn forgets to make itself interesting.  But perhaps the idea of space travel was interesting in of itself back in 1950, what with the space race budding and about to bloom.  But for a film to have staying power it needs to have actual content, which Rocketship X-M is sorely lacking.  It's not without merit, posing "What if...?" ideas toward the end about what we may find without going into too much detail, though it takes a while to get there and the payoff doesn't quite make the journey worth it.

For a fairly low budget cash grab, I will say Rocketship X-M is a pretty well made movie.  It features decent acting, moderately fine direction, and an enthusiasm for its subject matter.  Unfortunately it's stuck in a limbo between seriousness and camp, as if the crew of Lost in Space were hired to make an episode of Star Trek.  I cherish both shows, but they're worlds apart.  X-M feels like the work of a crew that doesn't quite understand the forward thinking film they've been asked to make, and they just create a ponderous bore trying to be insightful.

The most lasting scene in the film is the final one, where the RX-M crashes and the mission is deemed a "failure," though it then retracts that and states that there is no such thing.  This should be a stepping stone to more successful missions in the future.  This is a fairly smart way of justifying the grim fate of our main characters, and points out that failure is the path to success.  That's pretty philosophical for a film made just to leech off the profits of another.

The Episode

Cut one off, two shall take its place.  One cast member is replaced by two, as Josh Weinstein bids farewell to the series to forge his own destiny, while Kevin Murphy picks up the Tom Servo puppet and Frank Conniff takes over evil henchman duties.  This episode is most often considered to be the start of what most people think of when they think of Mystery Science Theater 3000, because we get the status quo lineup of Joel, Kevin, Trace, and Frank and that status quo would last for a good 73 episodes, longer than any other lineup in the series (challenged only by Mike, Kevin, Bill, and Mary Jo, which still didn't even come close at 48).  Kevin alone has the longest riffing run of any comedian on the series, having riffed in 163 episodes as well as the movie (he would also appear as Bobo in three episodes of The Return).

There are a lot of fans who flat out refuse to watch all episodes before this one (those people suck), because the episodes before this just aren't as funny.  But watching Rocketship X-M after seeing season one...I gotta say, it's not really that much of an improvement.  In fact I'd make the argument that about half of the KTMA and season one episodes are actually quite a bit funnier than this one.

One thing that can be said about Rocketship X-M's riffing is that it's a lot smoother in delivery than previously seen on the show.  In previous seasons, jokes seemed rather subdued and repressed, not delivered with a lot of color.  One can tell with this one they've decided to be a bit more animated in the theater and engage with the film as if they're actually conversing with it and not talking toward it.  This would do them well in the future, even if the riffing here is a mixed bag.  There's a lot of stale and repetitive jokes in this one.  They ride on the "By this time my lungs were aching for air." Lloyd Bridges reference a lot.  And I mean a lot.  And quite a few other jokes fail to land, tuning into season one's pitfall of often saying a joke just to make a joke.  Crow doing a Lucille Ball impression isn't funny if there's no real contextual reason it's being referenced, and that kinda goes for quite a few jokes here.  Then there are other times where they are just reduced to just yelling "SHUT UP!"

I find myself reflecting on the movie a bit during this episode and wonder if maybe it's the film's fault.  Rocketship X-M is not a good movie, not by a long shot, but it's very wordy and uneventful for about a good hour of it's runtime.  Perhaps the comments get lackluster because there isn't really anything to comment on.  While old space travel movies are sometimes perfect for the show, this one proves to be an exception.

For the most part I laughed more often during the host segments, which introduce us to Tom Servo's new voice and TV's Frank, replacing the now MIA Dr. Erhardt.  Frank in particular is quite hilarious here, as he plays the role of an awkward trainee at a fast food restaurant who doesn't quite know what he's doing.  The biggest laugh of the episode is the very end in which the very first "Push the button, Frank" happens, and Frank can't quite figure it out.  This bit actually is probably funnier now than it was then, since Frank wound up pushing that button many times in his career and seeing him learn it for the first time is quite a treat.  On the Satellite, we're given one treasure of a host segment as Joel quizzes the Bots on things that are funny floating in space, meanwhile the salute to reporters segment is quite fun too.  The big loser to single out is Mike's cameo as Valaria from Robot Holocaust, which starts nowhere and somehow gets lost along the way.

This is an important episode that every fan should watch, however it's probably best to keep expectations in check.  The learning curve of how to approach this artform they've created is still in effect and while new techniques are being practiced, new lessons are still being learned.  But it has its moments and provides us with this curious case of foreshadowing...

"Why didn't you just show us Marooned?"

"We couldn't get it!"

Oh give it a couple of seasons.

Average

The DVD

Rocketship X-M has never graced home video, however Shout Factory saw fit to release the host segments on the Satellite Dishes DVD of their Volume XXXIX collection.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (Rifftrax)

Film Year:  1989
Genre:  Science Fiction, Adventure
Director:  William Shatner
Starring:  William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Nichelle Nichols, George Takei, Walter Koenig, Laurence Luckinbill, David Warner
Rifftrax Year:  2006
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

The crew of the Enterprise are called back from shore leave to deal with a rogue Vulcan named Sybok, Spock's half brother, who has taken the human, Klingon, and Romulan ambassadors of Nimbus III hostage.  After a failed attempt to rescue the prisoners Kirk discovers that the ambassadors are working with Sybok and they seize control of the Enterprise.  Sybok intends to take the Enterprise to the mythological planet of Sha Ka Ree, which is where they will supposedly find God.

Star Trek V:  The Final Frontier is the long time whipping boy of the Star Trek film franchise, like Spock's Brain or just Wesley Crusher in general.  It's not a good movie by any means, but I find it a bit more frustrating than all-out bad.  There are certainly concepts here that would have made for a great Star Trek adventure, and there are scenes where you can see what star/director William Shatner was going for, but the execution just kills the entire thing.  If I were to compare it to episodes of the original series, I'd say it's more like the goofy, campy ones that are kinda fun to laugh at due to a silly execution to a potentially strong premise than the downright bad ones.  And hey, it has more going for it than your average episode of Star Trek:  Voyager.

It doesn't really excuse it from being a bad movie, though seasoned Star Trek fans might be more tolerant of it's crappyness than just a general moviegoer.  This movie has those characters they know and love, and while they're given some cringe-worthy scenes and dialogue (I refuse to believe that Spock doesn't know how to pronounce the word "marshmallow," marshmelon my ass), and they're still actors we like playing characters we love.  They're exaggerated for comic effect more often than normal here, what with Scotty ramming his head on a beam he supposedly was looking directly at and Sulu and Chekov getting lost and blaming a blizzard on a clear and sunny day, but I guess you can take what you can get?

But speaking of humor, is it just me or does it really overwhelm this entire production?  There's a running gag throughout the entire movie that the Enterprise is constantly malfunctioning but the Enterprise is brand new, christened in the previous movie.  Would Starfleet really put out a starship that is seemingly a deathtrap?  Or was it really cobbled together in a few days like it seemed in the last movie, all during that probe invasion by aliens that wanted to talk to whales?  No wonder the thing is falling apart.

But if I were to judge it based on the story, I kinda like it.  It's not well done and doesn't quite pay off, but it's an interesting idea at least.  Star Trek V demands to be a better movie, but it seems to have a hard time focusing itself.  Why does everything need to be funny?  Why does "God" need to be a villain without context?  Why does Shatner have to be the director?  What do the Klingons have to do with anything?  Why is there a cat-woman-stripper?  Why does Uhura strip naked at her comrades' insistence and wave feathers around?

There is no answer.  Or is it like the mountain that Kirk climbs at the beginning?  Are all of these things here "because they're there?"

The Trax

After his two successful solo debuts for Rifftrax, Mike now has the money to tap longtime Tom Servo operator Kevin Murphy to help him out with his third, which is the first multi-riffer Rifftrax.  Kevin would eventually become a Rifftrax mainstay, while our third regular riffer, Bill Corbett, wouldn't come riff with Mike until X-Men, while the three of them wouldn't unite as a trio until Independence Day.  But for now it's just good to hear Mike have someone to bounce off of.

This is also the first time they riffed a Razzie award winner for Worst Picture, something MST never got around to doing.  Further Worst Picture winners Rifftrax has tackled include Cocktail, Battlefield Earth, Transformers:  Revenge of the Fallen, The Last Airbender, and The Twilight Saga:  Breaking Dawn Part 2.  There are a whole lot more in nominees though.

Star Trek V:  The Final Frontier seems to be something of a movie that fans of MST have wanted to see mocked for many years.  Way back when among the more well known fan MSTings were a pair of fan films that riffed on this movie and Highlander II:  The Quickening.  In these days post iRiffs and Incognito Cinema Warriors XP I'm not sure if these fan efforts are as well known or circulated anymore, but back then efforts like this were a rare thing.  But I suppose Rifftrax made that fan film obsolete very early on by unleashing MST alums Mike Nelson and Kevin Murphy on this notoriously crappy Star Trek movie.  After all, it's hard to compete with the big dogs.

I am unsure if Mike and Kevin are Trek fans.  While they probably aren't they at the very least seem to have a passing knowledge of the more notorious details of it, like Spock's Brain.  While they seemingly don't hate it, they do have a bit of an interest in how clean cut it is and they desire to dirty it up.  The combination is a fairly brilliant one, because the movie is playing the straight man to their routine, and if any franchise can be a straight man it's Star Trek.  It's also of note that there are an awful lot of fart jokes in this riff, but the movie pretty much invited them to by making an uncharacteristic verbal fart joke of its own by pointing out that "bourbon and beans are an explosive combination."  Once the movie opens that can of worms, then all bets are off.

"Ugh!  Captain, we're approaching the plausibility barrier!  I cannot suspend disbelief for much longer!"

They have a lot of fun with these iconic characters that should be familiar to just about anyone, even those who dislike Star Trek.  Everyone knows Kirk, Spock, Scotty, and Sulu, and most might also be familiar with McCoy, Uhura, and Chekov.  This group needs no introduction and Mike and Kevin just jump right in with their character traits, such as George Takei impressions, picking apart Chekov's accent, noting Uhura's embarrassing fan dance sequence, Scotty's technical jargon and how much weight he has gained since the original series, and played up (sexual) tension between Spock and McCoy.  That just leaves William Shatner's Captain Kirk, who is of course the biggest target of them all.  Shatner not only stars in this thing, but co-wrote and directed it, which of course leaves him wide open to ego riffs and imitations of his "acting style," so to speak (with a lot of whispers of "Spoooooock..." along the way).  And there are a lot of Priceline.com riffs, since he was their spokesperson at the time.  But that seems somewhat irrelevant now.

It has been a while since I've listened to this Rifftrax, but I think it has aged well over the years.  Those who have wanted to see this long since accused "worst" Star Trek movie (at least until Nemesis and Into Darkness happened) will get a kick out of this riff.  Those who don't like Star Trek will probably be amused at how it's lampooned.  The only real downside is that I think it slides a little bit in laughs about halfway through, but this is a pretty good one and a great introduction to Kevin on Rifftrax.

Good

Rediscovery: Puppets (Rifftrax Shorts)

Rifftrax Year: 2014
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

Mike, Kevin, and Bill should know more than their fair share about puppets, having worked on a puppet show for a good portion of their professional careers.  But that won't stop VCI on lecturing them on how to craft and work their own!

This short is another of VCI's crafts shorts targeted at kids, and like all of its brethren it's a monotonous affair filmed in seemingly real time and told with a bored narrator.  Some of the puppet making techniques are creative, but when it comes to sculpting clay heads they should probably note that it's unlikely that yours would come out nearly as well.

"This is what plays in Tim Burton's head 24/7."

Like just about all VCI shorts, Mike, Kevin, and Bill play up the idea that they are creeped out by it.  They find the puppets scary, and sometimes play with the idea that crafting these things is some sort of satanic ritual.  There are also riffs at the expense of how bored someone would have to be to actually do any of this.  But let's think about what kids had to do in the 70's.  There were Hanna-Barbara cartoons and Pong.  So yeah, they were pretty bored.

While I wouldn't say this is one of their better VCI offerings, like just about all of them there are some great laughs to be had with this one.  The only real issue is that sometimes these shorts just seem exactly like the last, but I'm still having fun.

Thumbs Up

👍

Lady Frankenstein (ICWXP)

Film Year:  1971
Genre:  Horror
Director:  Mel Welles
Starring:  Joseph Cotton, Rosalba Neri, Paul Muller, Peter Whiteman

The Movie

About as good as any horror movie you can imagine that was directed by Mr. Mushnik from Little Shop of Horrors, Lady Frankenstein tells the tale of Frankenstein...with a lady.  Baron Frankenstein's daughter Tania arrives home and discovers her father's ghastly experiments:  bringing corpses back to life.  On the night of his greatest success, Frankenstein's monster turns on his master and kills him, and in turn rampages through the village killing his creators...and couples having sex.  CHASTITY!  Meanwhile Tania uses her father's experiments to conspire to give his partner a youthful body and have her way with him.

I'm a fan of Frankenstein tales, having spawned my favorite films of the Universal Horror franchise, consistently enjoyable entries in Hammer's output, Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein, and the greatest of them all, Toho's Frankenstein Conquers the World.  Mystery Science Theater 3000 has riffed several films with mad scientists with experiments on corpses (such as The Brain That Wouldn't Die and The Atomic Brain), but they had never really took on an actual Frankenstein movie.  Leave it to the Incognito Cinema Warriors to dig one up (Cinematic Titanic would later do Frankenstein's Castle of Freaks and Rifftrax would tackle Frankenstein Island).  The movie they found was an Italian production most likely produced to capitalize on the popularity of Hammer's Frankenstein films, being released as it was winding down.

Lady Frankenstein mostly takes the Frankenstein tale, simplifies it, and adds gratuitous nudity to spice it up for the pre-internet-porn market.  There is a lot of ass in this movie, more ass than there is Frankenstein.  And then they top that with ass of Tania Frankenstein to balance it out.  If you thought your movies featuring corpse monsters stumbling around needed more nudity, then Lady Frankenstein is the movie for you.

Lady Frankenstein is a very upfront movie.  It doesn't really have anything new to add to the Frankenstein legacy, it just uses it to make a "whatever sells" horror movie.  Sometimes it becomes a tad incoherent as it utilizes its need to please moviegoers, such as the film's finale sex scene where the participants engage in intercourse while the building is burning down around them and the man strangles the woman, which is just bonkers.  It's not very engaging otherwise, though I can't say I was bored watching it.

The Episode

I think it was safe to say that I wasn't a fan of the previous Incognito Cinema Warriors episode.  After all of these years of hearing what an amazing fan project this was, watching and critiquing Bride of the Gorilla was a disappointing experience.  But for better or for worse, I've vowed to go the whole nine yards on their series of riffs.  Who knows, maybe they'll get better.  Given that ICWXP creator Rikk Wolf would prefer that I have started on episode two anyway, I guess maybe Lady Frankenstein is something of a second pilot for them.  So should I put Bride of the Gorilla behind me and listen to his advice?

I gotta admit, Mr. Wolf isn't wrong.  Lady Frankenstein is a vast improvement over its predecessor.  I started to be a bit more at ease with ICWXP when they got an early laugh out of me by riffing a curious background extra in the film with "Stop looking at the camera, please!  Thank you."  This is a riff that's better executed than anything they did in their first effort, well delivered and delivered with impeccable timing.  As they continue to watch this crazy Frankenstein feature I find that they've eased back on their overzealous delivery that annoyed me in Bride and settled back into a delivery system that, while it feels quite scripted at times, has a much better flow to it.  I enjoyed riffs on the monster itself, as well as a slight running gag about a missing staircase.  The jokes on Thomas, the mentally challenged manservant, borderline a bit tasteless but are largely hilarious.

That said, ICWXP does have a tendency to overshoot the target at times.  There are a few riffs in the episode on a character that they seem to think resembles Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.  While certain angles do work in their favor, for the most part the playing up of the resemblance becomes a huge stretch (I think he looks more like Gene Hackman than Mr. Burns, personally).  There are also points where they use the Benny Hill and Alfred Hitchcock Presents themes at times that don't quite work, which give me the feeling they put them in because they had nothing better to do at these moments.  But these are nitpicks since even the best riffing projects can have flat moments like these in them.

There is a bit of a change in the theater silhouette to further try and differentiate ICWXP from MST3K.  Now instead of theater seats at the bottom of the screen Rick and the Bots sit in a balcony...in theater seats at the bottom of the screen.  I'm glad they furthered themselves a bit more, but I'm not entirely sure the image works, since traditionally a balcony is above the screen and not below it.  Though I suppose one could make the argument that the projector is behind them and that's how they cast the shadow.

The host segments drop the laugh track, and I'm thankful for it.  For the most part I don't think the host segment scripting is a huge improvement over the last, though there are some quite funny moments in them.  This episode contains an arc about another survivor taking refuge in the theater, and pretty much being a freeloading slob.  Almost all of the segments are devoted to this, and not all of them are funny.  The best bit at his expense is the final segment where he begins dating a zombie girl off the street, which I'll admit had me laughing.  But the best segment of the bunch had nothing to do with this storyline at all, where Rick and the Bots make a charity promo for overprivilaged children.  This was well-written and pure gold.

I finished watching Bride of the Gorilla with the feeling that I experienced it just so I could add it to the blog.  When I finished watching Lady Frankenstein I felt like I actually had fun and would watch it again.  Lady Frankenstein is a massive improvement for the ICWXP gang, though they still have some kinks they need to sort out.  But I have more belief in this riffing team than I did when I started the episode, which is saying something.  This episode starts off with them riffing a trailer to their next movie, Bloody Pit of Horror (which as luck would have it was also riffed by Rifftrax).  I now look forward to reviewing that episode the next time ICWXP hits my rotation (as well as comparing it to the Rifftrax version at some point in the future).

Good

The DVD

Unlike Bride of the Gorilla, Rikk Wolf still offers Lady Frankenstein on DVD through icwxp.com as both a single disc and as a "Season 1 Collection" with Bloody Pit of Horror and Werewolf in a Girl's Dormitory.  The picture on the disc is an improvement over Bride of the Gorilla, with a bit more sharpness in the host segments.  Host segments are still in widescreen, though non-animorphic, while the theater segments are in full screen.  The disc has no special features.

William: From Georgia to Harlem (Rifftrax Shorts)

Rifftrax Year:  2016
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

William:  From Georgia to Harlem is the story of our title character moving to Harlem.  He explores his new neighborhood with his cousin Calvin though he feels like an outsider.  Eventually he gets beaten up by the local tough kids while Calvin runs away, then plays basketball, and everybody lives happily ever after.

I...guess?

This short was made by the "Learning Corporation of America," though I'm at a loss as to what I was supposed to learn from it.  Perhaps it's supposed to be a cultural contrast between Georgia and Harlem.  Or perhaps it is supposed to teach children about character, and the importance of keeping small town values as America becomes more urban.  But whatever the lesson is, I think it's lost in translation as the short film meanders around.

There's only so much I can take when it comes to bad acting, and this short presents me with more than enough for a lifetime.  The short mostly focuses on children who were most likely not actors at all, and attempts to go for a natural tone, but nothing about it feels natural at all.  The kids stand around and DECLARE their lines without any sense that they understand them.  And the parents are even worse, since for the most part they're offscreen and their dialogue is added in post.  And they deliver it the exact same way.

This short largely goes nowhere, so it would take some stellar riffing to save it.  While Mike, Kevin, and Bill aren't bad, for the most part I found my attention wandering during this effort.  The short is just such a brick wall and it takes more effort to knock it down.  There are a few bright moments, like Kevin "getting down and funky" toward the beginning had me laughing pretty hard.  I also really liked the riffs on the bullies.  But overall this short doesn't enthuse me really at all and it's just sixteen minutes wasted.

Thumbs Down

👎

613-The Sinister Urge

Film Year:  1960
Genre:  Drama, Crime
Director:  Edward D. Wood Jr.
Starring:  Kenne Duncan, James "Duke" Moore, Jean Fontaine, Carl Anthony, Conrad Brooks
MST Season:  6
Featured Short:  "Keeping Clean and Neat"

The Short

Children are nothing but low down dirty pigs and you know it.  To help them get in line and look like actual human beings this short presents a bossy narrator to harass a pair of children, Don and Mildred, and force them to clean until their hands bleed!  And then they have them clean up the blood!  And it better be spotless!

The movie is meant to be shown to children in classrooms in hopes that they would learn good grooming habits from it.  It's actually pretty informative, with some neat tips like clipping toenails after bathing being easier.  It's hard to find much fault in it at all, because for what it is it's effective.

The Movie

"This smut picture racket is worse than kidnapping or dope peddling."

If you didn't think pornography was the most evil industry of all, Ed Wood is here to convince you with his most startling and chilling tale yet.  The Sinister Urge tells the story of an exotic studio surrounded by violence and murder.  It seems that every girl who works under Gloria Henderson's studio winds up dead and the police investigate.  Meanwhile, Henderson continues to swindle young girls into posing promiscuously for her.

In a stunning case of irony, The Sinister Urge is the last film Ed Wood directed for about ten years, turning to pornography to pay the rent in the 1970's.  But if Wood were to heed his own warning he would have been corrupted by such a move, leered at women, and maybe even killed them for becoming too aroused or turning his back on such a murder should it have occurred.  I don't know what the porn industry was like in 1960, though I have my doubts that Ed Wood was authoritative on the subject either.

Trademark Ed Wood stamps are seen throughout:  Cheap sets used over and over again, wooden and poor acting that possibly stems from a lack of alternate takes, and a zealous approach through filmmaking incompetence.  I haven't seen all of Wood's films, though I haven't seen one that isn't entertaining yet due to his negligent craftwork.  The Sinister Urge wasn't one of the films whose filming was recreated for Tim Burton's biopic Ed Wood, but as goofy and different as it is, it probably should have been.

Note:  In a cute little Easter Egg that Ed Wood popped into his own movie, an office in this film features posters for Bride of the Monster and The Violent Years, both of which Ed Wood wrote and in the case of the former directed.  These two films ironically are also the other two films Wood made that were featured on Mystery Science Theater.  Less predominantly featured in the scene is a poster for Jail Bait.

The Episode

After directing Bride of the Monster and writing The Violent Years, bad movie legend Ed Wood assaults us for the third and final time with The Sinister Urge.  I knew I was in for a fun one when right out the gate we see a girl running in terror in her undergarments and Servo pipes up with the winner "Hey, she's trying to give someone the slip!"  This line and ensuing scene sets the tone for this episode, as the film gives them such a failed attempt at being alluring and erotic, which is different than what they usually do.  Still, this is Ed Wood, so mocking this thing is easy, so it's not too far outside of the box.  There's bad acting, long sequences of dialogue that lead nowhere, and erotica that isn't very erotic, and it's all skewered well.  This episode is a blast.

Even funnier than the film is the short.  Keeping Clean and Neat is a wonderful short for the series, and one of my personal favorites.  It is so fast-paced and Mike and the Bots go in full on sprint to keep up with it.  They're often putting precise riffs in to take advantage of small moments and facial expressions that last just a moment.  They work these in with some steady and hilarious riffs on a bossy narrator talking about clean underwear, kooky music, and obsessive compulsive cleaning habits.

The host segments take aim at a guilty pleasure of mine, 90's action movies.  Frank has seen one too many mad bomber flicks of late, including Speed, In the Line of Fire, and Blown Away, and has decided to blow up Deep 13.  Mike and the Bots turn into 90's movie cop cliches in an attempt to stop him.  As someone who has grown up on movies like this, these segments delight me and never fail to make me laugh.

The Sinister Urge is a strong, steady, and overall really fun episode.  It doesn't quite stand out from the pack and single itself out as a series best, but whenever I find it on my television I laugh like a goon and enjoy myself.  If one wishes the venture outside of the norm of sci-fi and monster movies that the show normally showcases, one can do much worse than to start here.

Good

The DVD

The Sinister Urge seduced us from the comfort of Rhino's Volume 9 collection, with terrific audio and video.  The DVD's sole special feature is a three minute intro by actor Conrad Brooks, who mostly just relates how he felt like James Dean holding a knife in the film and how he regretted doing his own stunts.

The short, Keeping Clean and Neat, was released in the Shorts Volume 2 compilation featured on Rhino's Volume 3 set.  This set was re-released by Shout Factory.

1114-At the Earth's Core

Film Year:  1976
Genre:  Fantasy, Adventure
Director:  Kevin Connor
Starring:  Peter Cushing, Doug McClure, Caroline Munro
MST Season:  11

The Movie

From pretty much the same crew of The Land That Time Forgot comes another adaptation of an Edgar Rice Burroughs novel, At the Earth's Core.  This "totally not Journey to the Center of the Earth" story revolves around a scientist played by Peter Cushing who invents a drill vehicle that will allow him to drill beneath the surface of the Earth.  He and his assistant, played by Doug McClure, make their fateful journey but soon find themselves drilling out of control into the core of the Earth.  There they find a human civilization of slaves who serve mind controlling bird monsters, which they vow to put a stop to.

Not much on logic or reason, At the Earth's Core is still somewhat fun to watch.  For what it's worth, if you enjoyed Land That Time Forgot you shouldn't have much of a problem with this one.  The pacing is better in Earth's Core and the monster scenes carry a bit more flavor to them.  That said, Time Forgot may have had a better story, so which one you enjoy more may be a bit of a toss up.  I might favor Earth's Core.

But it's also a bit of a misogynistic male gaze fantasy, as Doug McClure goes down into a new world, becomes alpha male, and finds that women down here desire to be "owned" by their men.  McClure has a romance with a native girl who feels insulted by his lack of desire to claim her as a piece of property, as all women are trophy's won in petty squabbles between men.  It is only when he manhandles her does she relent in becoming his mate.  What a weird lesson in eroticism.

Though for fans of fantasy settings and guys in rubber costumes playing monster, At the Earth's Core is serviceable.  The effects may look quite silly in spots, but they're fun to look at, and the rear projection scenes are actually pretty cool.  At the Earth's Core isn't high quality escapist fantasy, but it somehow manages to be just enough.

The Episode

Wedding bells are ringing and the big day is here.  In this season finale to MST's relaunch season test subject Jonah Heston is forced into a shotgun wedding with mad scientist Kinga Forrester.  Surprisingly upbeat about it, Jonah seems willing and able to love, honor, and cherish his bride for all eternity, while Kinga shows very little interest in Jonah at all, rather desiring the symbolic wedding itself.  The episode builds to the event with an opening "bachelor talk," Jonah introducing a new bot named Growler (a parody of Rowlf from the Muppets) to play piano at the wedding, while the jealous Max gets a pep talk from "alpha dog" Doug McClure (played by Joel McHale in a hilarious cameo).  This leads to the big finale event where Kinga and Jonah wed in front Pearl, Bobo, Observer, and a group of random Observers (played by Kickstarter backers), while Max unleashes Reptilicus Metalicus (which he discovered in Yongary) upon Jonah, bringing about an end of season cliffhanger of "What happened to Jonah?"  It's almost similar to the way Reno 911 used to close out it's seasons, with every character seemingly dying a horrible death only to have them emerge just fine in the following season opener.

Other, non-wedding related segments include new steampunk versions of the Bots, which are pretty awesome.  Crow also becomes a Mahar, one of those psychic bird monsters from the movie, and tries to put a spell on Jonah.  The Invention Exchange is mostly sidelined for wedding talk, though it still comes into play as verbal gags relating a funny idea:  Permanent Temporary Tattoos and a Rip Taylor Urn Cannon.

But there's a movie here too!  On the riffing end, I have to admit to being disappointed by the back half of season eleven's run.  I need to rewatch most of them, though by the time I got to this episode it had felt like they had run out of steam.  I didn't really expect much from At the Earth's Core, but I'll be honest with you it was a breath of fresh air post-Carnival Magic and The Christmas That Almost Wasn't.  The movie is far more fun than we have been getting lately, and the riffing plays it up with a joyous support of gags that play up the absurdity of the movie, or just make goofy fun even goofier fun.  One of the biggest laughs of the episode comes when Doug McClure verbally announces his desire to kill all the Mahar, so he grabs a rock and prepares to fling it at them, resulting in the quip  "This rock will DESTROY THEM ALL!"  It's such a beautifully absurd moment in a film that's full of them, and the riff is perfect.  There's also some great lines at the expense of Peter Cushing, who they play up as a doddering old fool.  The fakey monsters inspire great comedy as well, as all these rubber puppets tend to get some grand parallels between other film puppets, such as Jedi Master Yoda and Sam Eagle.

And probably underlining the entire thing is one hell of a callback, as Doug McClure makes the perfect pose causing Jonah and the Bots to shout in unison "Phineas T. MITCHELL!"

At the Earth's Core proves to be quite a good end to the season, bringing closure to a season that had its share of ups and downs, was mostly successful at recapturing the magic of the previous seasons but at the same time showed a lot of room for improvement.  I look to season twelve with optimism in hopes the right lessons were learned and there are still some great episodes heading in our direction.  But while lackluster episodes made this season a bit uneven, I will very much say I wouldn't trade the great episodes for anything else in the world.  And I'd also say this one is one of the better ones.

Good

The DVD and Blu-Ray

The eleventh season of Mystery Science Theater 3000 was released on DVD and blu-ray on Shout Factory's Season 11 collection.  Backers from the Kickstarter had early access to the DVD and blu-ray sets with exclusive bonus features in Shout Factory's Season 11 (#WeBroughtBackMST3K Collector's Edition).  At the Earth's Core was featured with fantastic high definition audio and video, while like all the episode discs it held no special features.  It did however share a disc with the previous episode, The Christmas That Almost Wasn't.

603-The Dead Talk Back

Film Year:  1993 (filmed in 1957)
Genre:  Mystery, Suspense
Director: Merle S. Gould
Starring:  Aldo Farnese
MST Season:  6
Featured Short:  "The Selling Wizard"

The Short

For those store-owners who need to know the importance keeping food fresh and cool with attractive packaging, this short is for you.  We see a large selection of refrigeration and freezing units as well as how it might display one's product.

And speaking of attractive packaging, here's a model in a skimpy outfit to guide us every step of the way.

For those maybe interested in how your fridge cools food down, this might be a helpful guide.  Though it's primary focus is to sell coolers to stores who might need them, but let's face facts, these models are long since out of production.  So the last point of interest for those who don't care is a pretty woman in a dress.  Yay!

The Movie

Originally filmed, edited, and completed in 1957, it appears somebody just forgot to release this movie.  Of course it couldn't be so bad somebody locked it up and had the decency to not subject the public to it, right?  ...Right?  Whatever happened to this movie it was unearthed in 1993 and released direct to video.  A year later it appeared on Mystery Science Theater, almost like an act of fate.

The Dead Talk Back is the story of a murder of a young girl, and a paranormal researcher living in the same boarding house is called upon to help solve the case.  Can he really communicate with the dead?  The answer is pure MST bad movie gold.

It's apparent while watching this film why nobody was in any rush to release it.  It's very drawn out, poorly structured, poorly acted, and by the end a complete waste of time.  The idea of a paranormal mystery is sound, but it feels like it was given to a group of people who didn't really know how to make a movie.

That's really all that can be said about this movie.  It's a limp nothing of a movie that doesn't inspire much to be written about it.  I'm happy that an unreleased film was found and given a chance, but it's hard to believe anybody was enthusiastic about it when it was discovered.

The Episode

The Dead Talk Back isn't an episode I remember much when I think back over the show.  But when I do think of it I always remember enjoying it just enough to say it was worth watching.  I think the movie itself is largely to blame for any forgettable tendencies one might have with this because it's a giant load of nothing.  But the riffing itself does a lot to give the film worth.  There are belly laughs aplenty, though not many huge ones.  The flaws in the film are very large and they are easy to pick at.  I love the narrator constantly reminding the audience that the woman they're following is going to die at any moment, only to have Crow point out that any suspense is going out the window because we know what's going to happen.  The film gets weirder and weirder, and Mike and the bots get more flippant and dismissive as a result.  The movie stops feeling like it's trying to be a real movie, so they stop treating it like one and it just becomes something to react to because it exists.

Likewise, The Selling Wizard also isn't a short I remember much when I think back over the show.  Watching again now it occurs to me that it's probably because of how talky it is, and the riffers can hardly get a word in edgewise.  There are definite moments where they drop to silence and just kind of listen to the short because they can't fit a joke in, which is sometimes frustrating.  What material that does get through is uneven, though there are some nice laughs.  It's not the worst short of the series (my personal vote goes to Junior Rodeo Daredevils on that one), though it's toward the bottom.

The host segments are more or less defined by the Grateful Dead parody in which Crow goes on an obnoxious guitar solo that fills up almost three host segments.  It's actually fairly funny, kinda in the way Sideshow Bob stepping on rakes in The Simpsons is funny.  It just keeps going and going, past the point where you've had enough and back to the point where you find it funny again.  Other host segments include a Dead Talk Back radio show and a fire drill, which are both cute.

 But I'd have to say this is a strange case where Mike and the Bots lift a movie on their shoulders in a celebratory move in showing off this weird thing that was lost for decades, but maybe being on this show gave purpose to it being made.  Life's funny that way.

Good

The DVD

The Dead Talk Back communicated with the living via Rhino's Volume 8 collection.  The video had constant tape flaws, and the audio is mostly fine though slightly garbled in one second.  There were no bonus features.  The volume was rereleased by Shout Factory with better results, and even an interview with actor Myron Natwick to boot!

The Selling Wizard was featured in Shorts Volume 3, which Rhino released as an online exclusive on their Essentials set.  Shout Factory rereleased it as a part of The Singles Collection.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: Volume 4 DVD Retrospective

Release Date:  November 18th, 2003
Re-Release Date:  January 31st, 2017

Buy Rhino set here!
Buy Shout Factory set here!

Features the following episodes:
Girl in Gold Boots
Hamlet
Overdrawn at the Memory Bank
Space Mutiny

Volume 4 of our favorite puppet show finally taps the episodes featured on the Sci-Fi Channel, which have been a long time coming.  Better still it contains one of the most beloved episodes of the series in Space Mutiny, and two other quite popular episodes backing it up with Overdrawn at the Memory Bank and Girl in Gold Boots.  Also good news is that after two sets with a bonus shorts compilation disc we actually have a fourth episode in this collection.  Deflating any enthusiasm for that fourth episode for most fans is the fact that the fourth episode is Hamlet, one of the least popular episodes of the series (most likely included because the public domain film was easily to procure).  While Hamlet's easily the worst episode of the set, I personally like it quite a bit, which makes this set play stronger to me than most people might view it.

Average Rating (scale of 1 to 4):  3.25

Episodes presentations are pretty solid, though Space Mutiny has some barely noticeable flaws with the transfer and Hamlet has a bizarre issue with the theater seats in the opening theater segment that could honestly just be a flaw in the episode itself and not the DVD release.  Special features are regulated to intros by Michael J. Nelson for each episode, which are the first retrospective features ever produced for an MST DVD.  Volume 5 would later take this a step further with a lengthy interview with Mike and Kevin Murphy, while Shout Factory would ride on introductions quite a bit when they started carrying the torch.  Girl in Gold Boots also features a trailer and a TV spot.

The box itself is Rhino's typical fold out box for the series.  The outer box features a hole that sees the MST logo on a layer through it, while theater seats sit at the bottom and look up at orbs that are orbiting it, which include stills from the movies on the interior.  Initial copies of the volume set also had the "Volume 4" orb pushed out with a glued on plastic piece, though this made a uniform shelf collection problematic (my copy is without this).  The hole featured for the logo is also easy to tear as well.

Inside we have the same art, sans the hole.  Opening the box further is a nice photo of Mike, Crow, Servo, and Gypsy.  Opening that further we find the discs, each with a label that looks like the moon, while behind the discs themselves are stills from the episodes.

Moving on to the menus, Girl in Gold Boots features a bunch of go-go dancers getting jiggy to a generic tune.  Hamlet features clips from the movie being played against what looks like a dungeon wall.  Overdrawn at the Memory Bank has what looks like a bubble-wrapped microchip (?), with some of the retro effects from the movie thrown in.  Space Mutiny features a generic grid with characters from the movie fading in an out on it, while also featuring Servo in a flying pod and Crow in a Ballerian outfit.  As per usual, these Mike episode feature Joel at the bottom of the menus in the theater seats for some reason, with the sole exception being Girl in Gold Boots.  That series of clips seem to be ripped straight from the episode and the theater seats with it.

You get pretty much the same thing with Shout's set, which features the same transfers for the episodes (flaws for Space Mutiny and Hamlet intact) and the intros are kept, as well as the trailer and TV spots for Girl in Gold Boots.  This set is a slimmed down DVD case which features Shout's stock re-release art of the theater seats looking up at the MST logo.  Interior disc art is just episode titles against a starry backdrop, while menus keep the stock theme alive with theater seats looking at titles against a starry backdrop.  Normally these menus use the closing theme as music, though the only one here that does is Hamlet, which also uses the "To Be or Not To Be" soliloquy during it.  Girl in Gold Boots uses the theme from the movie itself, while both Space Mutiny and Overdrawn port over the menu music from the Rhino release.

Volume 4 is a great set to own, especially for those of us who grew up on the Sci-Fi era.  I can wholeheartedly recommend three of the episodes, while Hamlet is probably not one for newbies.  But if you're a practiced fan of the series I say give it a shot.  The majority dislike the episode, but you might be surprised at how funny it really is.  I'd daresay that this might be one of the most consistent sets on the market.

1009-Hamlet

Film Year:  1961

Genre:  Drama

Director:  Franz Peter Wirth

Starring:  The voice of Ricardo Montalban and an actor named Paul Verhoeven who isn't that Paul Verhoeven

MST Season:  10

The Movie

William Shakespeare's Hamlet.  Quite possibly the most endurable and everlasting play ever written, other than perhaps Romeo & Juliet.  It has been adapted for film many times by filmmakers such as Laurence Olivier, Mel Gibson, and Kenneth Branagh, and has served as inspiration for films such as Akira Kurosawa's The Bad Sleep Well and Disney's animated feature The Lion King.

So obviously the first film we think about in relation to Hamlet is a made for television German film.

The story of Hamlet should need no introduction.  The title character is the Prince of Denmark, haunted by the ghost of his deceased father.  He is told that his uncle Claudius murdered the King to be crowned King himself and marry Hamlet's mother.  Unsure of whether or not this is the truth, Hamlet devises a scheme to make Claudius's guilt apparent and seek retribution.

Drab and dour, and with a monotonous dub that's doing it no favors, this particular version of Hamlet is a bit of a sour experience.  It never let's the viewer's attention span take over and just kind of stands still and announces the play at the audience.  It's like a really bad High School performance full of actors who think angst is ACT-TING!

But still, Hamlet is Hamlet, no matter how poorly done.  This version is probably done a disservice by being featured on Mystery Science Theater because it was initially two and a half hours long!  About half the movie was cut out to fit into the show's format, enough of a length that they could have easily made a two part episode out of it.  But considering what is onscreen, another hour of this might have been murderously boring.  Forget the ear poison, just put on this movie instead.

The Episode

Aha!  Mike gets the upper hand on Pearl, Bobo, and Observer with a game of Three Card Monte.  As a reward he gets to pick the movie this week, and he chooses "The greatest drama of all time," Hamlet.  But Pearl has this puppy up her sleeve instead.

Good one, Nelson!

Widely considered by fans as the worst episode of Mystery Science Theater ever filmed, I find Hamlet to be a lot better than it's reputation.  I remember sitting down to watch this episode in 1999 and being intrigued by the idea of riffing Shakespeare, and as I watched I had an admiration for what they were doing, their approach to it, and their general level of enthusiasm for doing something so outside of their comfort zone.  When it ended I didn't think it was their funniest episode, but I had a generally positive impression of it.  It wasn't until I started to get into the online MST community that I started reading about how hated this episode was, and I kind of blinked and said "Really?"  But then again, I had the same reaction upon discovering people considered Pod People and The Final Sacrifice among the best of the series.

Hamlet is something different, experimental, and while it's slower paced, it has enough laughs to be considered above average.  The inherent problem of making an MST episode out of a Shakespeare play is that there is a lot of dialogue.  Writing around it proves problematic because there is hardly any space and writing over it could create an incoherent experience.  One of the pros however is that...well, it's Hamlet.  Even if you do write over the dialogue your general audience member still won't lose grip of the movie because chances are they were brow-beaten with this play during their literary studies in Junior High School.  But still they need to respectfully dance around it, and Mike and the Bots do about as well as they can in the circumstances.

There is a bit of a thick question in the air of how can you riff Hamlet at all.  Do you take aim at the production?  Sometimes they do.  They notice little overblown movements that don't quite work in the actors' favor as they perform this play.  One of my favorites is during a monologue from the King's ghost the film focuses squarely on Hamlet's face, causing Crow to peak around the corner looking for the source of the voice and Mike to urgently state "Camera 2!  Cut to Camera 2!"  There's also weird facial expressions, like Queen Gertrude's wide eyes causing the quip "My contacts are fine!"  Do they litter it with contemporary humor to contrast the dated "Thou, thy, and thee" dialogue?  Often that's the case.  They give little modern touches to plot developments, like Gertrude marrying Claudius, and giving them little notes like "Slut...I mean, what?" or Hamlet going to confront the ghost of the King, while his companions stay behind and shout "Go get 'em, Ham!  Kick his ass!"  A favorite moment of mine happens when Ophelia descends into madness and starts singing, causing Crow to state "Ugh, it's Jewel.  Get her out of here!"  And then there are moments where they find an opening and just heckle the play, with shots like "Lights, camera, soliloquy!" and Crow giving the Claudius-manipulated Laertes the knobish misinterpretation that he should kill Hamlet by cutting his throat in a Church.

I quite enjoy the host segments too.  They actually keep the energy level of the episode up to counteract the slow crawl of the movie.  I adore the opening segment in which Tom Servo officially changes his name to Htom Sirveaux.  The Three-Card Monte opener is pretty funny, and it sets up the very different movie selection this week brilliantly.  They play with the core concept of Hamlet in many interesting ways throughout, with the Bots putting on an interpretive musical theater version of the play and a game show centered around the famous "Alas Poor Yorick" scene.  We close with a wildly funny visit by a cut character from the play named Fortinbras and the cute Hamlet action figure.

In the end, as different as this episode is, it's probably not surprising that it wound up being divisive.  Most people want what they're familiar with.  But I have to disagree strongly with those who claim this episode is "unwatchable."  It's perfectly watchable, and I've watched it many times.  But I don't really find any episode of MST to be unwatchable, though this wouldn't be one that I would put in my bottom ten "close to unwatchable" episodes if I ever compiled a list.  I've always found it charming.  Maybe it's a little bit of an enigma why some people think it's a solidly funny episode while most find it a taint upon the series, but as someone here who does enjoy it I can assure you that we enjoy it for a reason.

Good

The DVD

Hamlet was released early on in the DVD volumes, much to the dismay of this episode's detractors everywhere.  But the film featured is in public domain, so it makes sense that is was one of the first Sci-Fi era episodes released.  Rhino released it on the all-Sci-Fi-episode debut collection of Volume 4, featuring a bizarre flaw that may be native to the episode itself and not just the DVD.  The first theater segment is a bit odd in that the picture of the film is fine but the theater seats are actually pixelated for some weird reason.  The sole special feature is an intro by Michael J. Nelson in which he assures us we'll enjoy it (most disagreed).

Shout Factory later released the episode as a Shout Select single exclusively through their website.  There were no bonus features.

Volume 4 was later re-released by Shout Factory with Hamlet still intact.  And the pixelated theater segment remains, leaving me to conclude it's just how the episode was mastered for some reason.  Mike's intro is retained.