The Dr GOLD FOOT COLLECTION
Bikini Kill
released 25 January 1965/1966 | PG | Blu-ray/dvd Directors Norman Taurog/Mario Bava Cast Vincent Price, Frankie avalon, Fabian, susan Hart, laura antonelli
In his ’60s pomp James Bond had to contend with as many spoofs and knock-offs as bullets and sharks. Two of the more lamentable cash-ins found silky horror icon Vincent Price slipping into a smoking jacket to play the diabolical Dr Goldfoot, a powercrazed scientist commanding an army of lethal, gorgeous fembots.
The gloriously named Dr Goldfoot And The Bikini Machine finds the Aladdin-slippered mastermind assigning his underclad robot army to seduce and kill the world’s wealthiest men. Teen heartthrob Frankie Avalon is Craig Gamble, bungling agent 001/2 of SIC (Secret Intelligence Command). With an upbeat high-camp vibe somewhere between Get Smart and the Batman TV show, it’s a film that never quite delivers on the delirious mod-era grooviness it promises, wasting the mighty Price among limp slapstick and broad bedroom farce.
“Meet the girls with the thermo-nuclear navels!” cries the poster for truly woeful sequel Dr Goldfoot And The Girl Bombs, an Italian co-production directed, improbably, by Euro-horror maestro Mario Bava. Goldfoot’s deadly harem is now targeting military top brass in a bid to spark World War Three. Replacement hunk Fabian mugs alongside Italian comedy duo Franco Franchi and Ciccio Ingrassia (Tommy Cooper and Ron Hitler from Sparks, essentially) and the whole giddy, lascivious mess collapses into an extended chase sequence, like a comedy sketch without the good grace to know when to end.
Price called it his “most dreadful movie”. But somewhere Mike Myers was taking notes…
Extras A bonus disc featuring the 1961 Price film Master Of The World. Nick Setchfield