Wasp Woman (1995)

A Remake of 50’s Corman Cult classic is just so awful it makes the original appear like even more of a gem.  The plot follows the flagging career of a supermodel and owner of a massive cosmetic corporation whose world seems crumbling around her due to the terrible curse of age.

There is little doubt that our once gorgeous beauty, Ms Starlin, is no longer quite the nymph.  The wrinkles are showing up again, and the company’s main cameraman has to use softer and softer lenses to disguise the wrinkling process.

However, hope is at hand when a mysterious figure calling himself Dr Xinthrop offers our ex-beauty a shot of his newly discovered wasp serum which he promises will revitalize and restore her previous beauty.  The serum has astonishing results, and Ms Starlin develops new confidence to match her rediscovery of lost beauty.  Her business recovers as new contracts start flowing in, and her errant boyfriend returns to her, drooling.

Unfortunately, the side effects soon kick in, and our fab Ms Starling starts turning into a blood-lusting Wasp with a deadly instinct to kill.  The wasp outfit is something Galtier would be proud of – it probably cost more than half the cost of production, as the rest of the film is about as cheap and tacky as can be.

The wasp attack in the opening scene of the film is so cheesy the “animated” wasps look more like imperfections on the video print rather than anything resembling insects… but then there is a loud droning sound as an accompaniment which serves to remind the viewer that those blotches on the screen are a menacing strain of killer African wasps!  The other wasp transformation scenes are at least as rip-roaringly atrocious.

The acting is, well, almost indescribably awful, and it doesn’t come as a great surprise to find that one hasn’t seen any of the performers in any film ever since.  Better sense probably prevailed in their cases.  The film is so inept that it is bound to find its fans in purveyors of the truly horrible.  This ill-advised remake is one of those cheesy, z grade efforts which makes the grade because of its sheer audacity and the quality of its rank awfulness.  Good for a chuckle here and there, with loads of added Cormanesque nudity thrown in.  However, it fails to match Corman’s original classic by many a mile, specifically for scholars of schlock.  Also, tellingly Jennifer Ruben is no Susan Cabot.