Invasion of the Bee Girls

Yes, this is quintessential 70's B movie stuff that has it all: bad acting, crazy plot strands, a far-out story about girls becoming human bees and killing men with over-exhaustion in the sexual act, and lots of pretty, bosomy girls not afraid to keep you abreast of their physical attributes. Government agent Will Smith goes to Peckham, California, to look into the death of a researcher at Brandt Research. He comes in the midst of a huge death tally as in one day or soon the number of men that have died from over-exhaustion rises to 10. We get to see some of these deaths and there is absolutely nothing scary about them. The whole film seems to have a very campy edge to it. That is a credit to first time screenwriter Nicholas Meyer who wrote The Seven-Percent Solution and the scripts for several Star Trek movies as well as directed many good films later on. Meyer's script is absurd at times but he along with the director are able to keep it not quite real - if you know what I mean. The budget is a bit higher than many films of this era but has obvious constraints. The bee hive room was impressive as are many of the female leads. Anitra Ford is gorgeous with her long legs and playful eyes, but she is nothing next to Victoria Vetri who fills a blouse beautifully. Both women are adequate thespians as well(I'm sure this is of a grave concern for viewers of films like this). Invasion of the Bee Girls is one of those really fun movies from the seventies that mixes just enough sleaze with other elements like science fiction to come up with a viewing pleasure despite its obvious shortcomings.

Okay, here's another strong contender for winning the award of sleaziest and absolute most insane B-movie of the 1970's! The human race, and particularly the male species, is threatened with extinction because of … ordinary women turned into life-sized bee monsters! How it is possible for anyone to think of such a plot, I do not know, but this movie honestly handles about a continuously expanding community of women that completely cover the newest members in honey until the pupils of their eyes turn pitch-black and then, subsequently, they celebrate by caressing their own breasts for five whole minutes! God bless 70's cinema… In the small Californian town of Peckham, which is famous for being the hometown of the pharmaceutical Brandt factory, the lifeless bodies of several men are discovered. The cause of death in all cases appears to be sexual exhaustion and, since some of their own eminent scientists were involved, the Brandt Company sends over government inspector Neil Agar over to investigate. The deaths started since the gorgeous Dr. Susan Harris, who's always wearing thick sunglasses and gets invited for lunch by all her male colleagues, launched a bizarre new series of experiments involving radiation. The plot of "Invasion of the Bee Girls" is totally ridiculous and cheesy nonsense, yet the film is very entertaining and spawns an irresistible sense of humor. Multiple sequences are downright hilarious, for example, when during a town's meeting, some doctor suggests a period of total sexual abstention, and the build-up towards each new male victim is a portrayal of pure and gold girl power! Nearly every guy in this town is a horny weakling, ready to cheat on his wife at all times. The ladies, on the other hand, are elegant and charismatic creatures with a lot more brain capacity than the males…even though they fondle their own breasts for no reason. Needless to say "Invasion of the Bee Girls" features tons of gratuitous nudity and lurid situations that don't make the slightest bit of sense. There's an overlong attempted-rape scene that really adds nothing to the plot, while the grand finale seems rushed and amateurish. With the exception of Anitra Ford as the queen bee, the women aren't really attractive, but they unscrupulously take all their clothes off in front of the camera. Respect, ladies! Another interesting trivia-detail: "Invasion of the Bee Girls" was the writing debut of Nicholas Meyer, who went on to script several acclaimed "Star Trek" movies.

In the small town of Peckham, California, many men die for excessive effort during sexual intercourse. When a scientist from the Brandt research laboratory is found dead in a motel, the government sends Agent Neil Agar (William Smith) to investigate the mysterious deaths. He suspects that the deaths may be related to some experiments of Dr. Susan Harris (Anitra Ford), who is researching bees in the Brandt facility.

"Invasion of the Bee Girls" is a delightful and enjoyable B-movie. The dark cinematography is awful with very bad lighting and horrible direction; the flawed screenplay and dialogs are silly and very funny; most of the actors and actresses are ham, with terrible acting and ridiculous dialogs (when one of the guys, referring to his friend that has just died in a motel, says to his colleagues in the bar "- Imagine, coming and going at the same time", I laughed a lot) ; there are many beautiful naked women, free nudity with lots of breasts and hilarious scenes, like, for example, the unique shot of the hero along the whole story is in a lever of a computer that provokes fire and lethal smoke everywhere in the room where the bee girls are gathered together. The actresses undress practically in every scene, without any motive, being a film of soft sexploitation. If you like trash-movies and beautiful nude women, see this flick. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Invasão das Mulheres Abelhas" ("Invasion of the Bee Women")

Invasion of the bee girls is a unique little movie purely because of its premise: Sexy women, er, loving guys to death to take over the world. Sounds great, huh? The fact that these deadly babes are "bee" girls really isn't that important. They could be just about anything and the premise would still sell tickets. Is this premise well used, though? The answer is, not entirely. For a movie that focuses on sex, there is a surprising absence of sex in the movie. In fact there are only 3 "love" scenes in the whole movie. This wouldn't be so bad if they filled in the rest of the movie with something interesting. Instead, the filmmakers filled in the time with a bunch of "officials" just wandering around wondering what killed all the men. There are a few additional nude scenes (not sex scenes though) scattered about that make the more pointless scenes bearable, but the movie would be better if it were played as more of a camp/comedy/action/horror/porn flick rather than a dull mystery yarn. There is a surprising lack of humor in all this as well. The filmmakers even go as far as to put looks of fear and pain on the faces of the bee girls' mates rather than go for the obvious joke of putting smiles on them. This review may sound like I hate this movie but in fact, it is just the opposite. This movie is a real favorite of mine. This is probably due to the premise, which is alone worth the price of admission, the excellent acting, the sex (of course), and the well-done but scarce cheese/humor elements. I give Invasion of the Bee Girls **** out of **** but most viewers would probably rate it a * or ** out of ****.

Invasion of the Bee Girls (1973)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Cult classic science fiction film has a bunch of beautiful women killing men with sex. This film has a rather notorious reputation for its camp value and it certainly lives up to those standards. If you're wanting something serious then go check out The Day the Earth Stood Still as you aren't going to find anything serious here. The film is pure exploitation that only a drive-in could deliver and the movie features plenty of sex, naked women and wacky violence. Even better is some insane dialogue that will certainly make you laugh out loud. The actual story gets boring after a while and I'm sure a little editing would have helped.