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Diabolical Doctor Z
[Mondo Macabro]
1965; b&w
Directed by Jess Franco
Starring: Howard Vernon, Estella Blain, Mabel Karr, Guy Mairesse & Daniel J. White
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As some of you may know, the Kommandant is a huge Jess Franco fan. I can't say I knew too much about this extremely prolific and totally kooky Spanish director prior to our unholy union (in fact, I used to think he was an Italian director) but since then I have seen many a Franco film and have come to appreciate the subtle, and not so subtle, nuances of his style. Granted not all of his cinematic exercises can be considered classics but, more often than not, there's at least one fantastically memorable moment that makes you feel like you haven't completely wasted and hour and a half of your time. The particular film in question today, Diabolical Doctor Z, is filled with fantastically memorable moments. So many that I may not be able to mention them all in this review; but we're already here so we might as well give it a shot. When we get our first glimpse of the shaggy haired and oddly bespeckled Doctor Zimmer (aka Doctor Z.) he's injecting some substance into the neck of an unusually calm cat while his daughter / assistant, Irma, reads the paper. (I believe the unmarried daughter, who appears to be a doctor as well, could also be considered Doctor Z.; and both are somewhat diabolical during the course of the movie, so I'm not exactly sure which one the title refers to.) Maybe in some other movie this would lead you to think the elder, male Dr. Z. is a veterinarian of some sort, but with Franco at the helm we can assume Zimmer is no regular ol' doctor. And you can rest assured that the fact that it was a kitty, in addition to many other lovingly and carefully shot details, is so totally irrelevant that you might as well forget I said it now. Anywhoo, that assumption turns into fact as we soon learn that he is a doctor who has created a mind control machine, complete with a multi-armed contraption that holds the specimen about to have his mind controlled while their head is skewered by some long pointy thing. After experimenting on his furry friend and at least one escaped convict, Doctor Z. is officially ready to share his discoveries with the world at large. So he has his lovely daughter hustle his wheelchair bound ass on down to the local medical review board where attempts to do just that. The squares behind the long table (including the ever popular Howard Vernon) fail to recognize his genius however and, after being berated by the other doctors, Zimmer has a heart attack and dies on the spot. This leaves the younger, more attractive, female Doctor Z. to carry on her father's life's work AND avenge his untimely death. (When will she find time to marry and give birth to the nest generation of diabolical doctors?) First though she'll work through the stages of mourning by drowning her sorrows in booze; taking in an inspirational performance by Miss Death, whose routine includes writhing around her giant prop spider web and stalking her mannequin-man prey; picking up a pretty young female hitchhiker, joining the girl for a swim in a nearby lake, then running her over with her car and setting her and the car on fire before sending both careening into the lake. And all this happens in the first half-hour! Rest assured, the balance of the film follows the path we've journeyed down thus far as the only remaining Doctor Z. kidnaps Miss Death, turns her into a sexily dressed, non-flesh eating zombie killing machine with poison fingernails, and engages her help in picking off the men who did her father in one by one. Rounding out this excellent DVD package is a brief but entertaining documentary on Franco, a gallery featuring stills & poster art, production notes & cast biographies and trailers for this and many other Mondo Macabro titles.
—Bunny
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