I'd have to say this flick was kind of trippy, much in the same way the original film was back in 1958, which I still maintain was the very best year for all of the sci-fi and horror schlock that ever came out. It was gratifying to see a tribute to the earlier version of "Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman" when Daryl Hannah dropped in on the El Monte and a few brief clips made it onto the screen. As well as a nod to a year earlier classic when Nancy Archer (Hannah) asked Dr. Loeb (Paul Benedict) about his out-sized hypodermic needle - "So what's in that amazing colossal spike?" If you're a fan of this stuff, you'll know the writers threw in that reference to "The Amazing Colossal Man".
The choice of William Windom was a good one to portray Nancy's father, Hamilton Cobb. In a bit of role reversal, Windom portrays a father who tries to have his daughter committed for insanity so he can proceed with his empire building, but if you go all the way back to the original Star Trek TV series, Windom was actually the crazy one as Commodore Decker, a madman at the helm of the Starship Enterprise in the episode "The Doomsday Machine". It's one of the few, if not the only time, that a guest star took over that show.
Now I'm a big fan of this stuff as long as it stays relegated to the B Movie genre of the Forties and Fifties. A picture like this loses some resonance when done in color with a better known cast. And even so, it looked and sounded to me like the players were being terrible on purpose. The acting and dialog were below B grade, and Hannah was particularly wooden in her normal sized Nancy guise. But things did pick up a notch once she got into her angry mode. Anyone wonder how she came across those expertly tailored gigantic woman clothes? I know you're not supposed to think about stuff like that, but really, where did the duds come from?
Well it started out as kinky sci-fi and turned into a feminist manifesto near the finale, but for all that it's a fun flick if you go for this kind of stuff. The story line probably could have used a bit more of Dr. Loeb and Hard Luck Eddie (Hamilton Camp), but what the heck, you get what you get. If you could handle this and haven't seen the original, you owe it to yourself to see a classic that breaks the mold of the 'so bad it's good' genre.
The choice of William Windom was a good one to portray Nancy's father, Hamilton Cobb. In a bit of role reversal, Windom portrays a father who tries to have his daughter committed for insanity so he can proceed with his empire building, but if you go all the way back to the original Star Trek TV series, Windom was actually the crazy one as Commodore Decker, a madman at the helm of the Starship Enterprise in the episode "The Doomsday Machine". It's one of the few, if not the only time, that a guest star took over that show.
Now I'm a big fan of this stuff as long as it stays relegated to the B Movie genre of the Forties and Fifties. A picture like this loses some resonance when done in color with a better known cast. And even so, it looked and sounded to me like the players were being terrible on purpose. The acting and dialog were below B grade, and Hannah was particularly wooden in her normal sized Nancy guise. But things did pick up a notch once she got into her angry mode. Anyone wonder how she came across those expertly tailored gigantic woman clothes? I know you're not supposed to think about stuff like that, but really, where did the duds come from?
Well it started out as kinky sci-fi and turned into a feminist manifesto near the finale, but for all that it's a fun flick if you go for this kind of stuff. The story line probably could have used a bit more of Dr. Loeb and Hard Luck Eddie (Hamilton Camp), but what the heck, you get what you get. If you could handle this and haven't seen the original, you owe it to yourself to see a classic that breaks the mold of the 'so bad it's good' genre.