The Wasp Woman [Blu-ray]

Director: Roger Corman

Overview

One of schlock horror-meister Roger Corman's favored actresses Susan Cabot stars as the title character, otherwise known as Janet, in this her last feature film for Corman. Janet is the aging but still glamorous head of a cosmetics firm who is looking for a way to improve her visage. Zinthrep (Michael Marks) has come up with yet another of those strange-sounding lotions or cremes designed to enrich the coffers of their manufacturers as the ladies surge to buy them. This time around, an ingredient taken from wasps is substituted for an original ingredient from bees. While the immediate effect is exciting, the subsequent effects are even more so because the miracle lotion turns Janet into a wasp, and a rather well-developed wasp at that. So the poor woman, suffering under the throes of unexpected wasphood, murders a few shocked employees in a rather gruesome manner. Not overly frightening, this film is a typical Roger Corman entry in the horror genre.

Product Details

Release Date:	10/30/2018
UPC:	0826663190830
Original Release:	1959
Rating:	NR
Region Code:	A
Presentation:	[B&W]
Language:	English
Time:	1:03:00
Sales rank:	17,182

Special Features

New 2k scan of a fine grain print; Extended TV cut with 10 extra minutes; Audio Commentary with film historian/author Troy Howarth; Audio Commentary with film historian/author Tom Weaver; Theatrical Trailer

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Susan Cabot	Janice Starlin
Fred Eisley	Bill Lane,Bill Lane
Barboura Morris	Mary Dennison
Michael Mark	Eric Zinthrop
Frank Gerstle	Les Hellman
William Roerick	Arthur Cooper
Bruno Ve Sota	Night Watchman
Frank Wolff	First Delivery Man
Fred [Anthony] Eisley	Actor
Jennifer Rubin	Actor
Lynn Cartwright	Maureen Reardon
Roy Gordon	Paul Thompson
Dick Miller	Actor
Fred Katz	Composer

Technical Credits

Leo Gordon

Leo Gordon	Screenwriter
Roger Corman	Producer

Editorial Reviews

Considering the strange and terrible fate of the lead actress -- Susan Cabot apparently lived her own nightmare and was eventually killed by her increasingly browbeaten son -- The Wasp Woman takes on an added poignancy that obviously wasn't intended by the film's cheapskate producer-director, Roger Corman. Here is yet another creature flick hampered by a ludicrous monster costume -- nothing more than a Halloween mask, really -- not quite as bad as it could have been but not very good either. Cabot herself does well enough as the youth-obsessed heroine/villainess and the film does attempt to address both the increasing paranoia regarding aging and science run amok. But the cheesy special effects (if you can call a rubber mask and a couple of claws "special effects") and lack of any kind of budget betray the good intentions. Typical of Corman, the supporting roles are well cast (including the stunning Lynn Cartwright as a Brooklyn-accented secretary) and an attempt to turn modern office life into a sort of Grand Guignol melodrama works at least part of the way.