The Wasp Woman

The wasp costume design was excellent, but the acting, plot changes and action sequences are pretty cringy.

This was part of a series of Showtime produced remakes of Roger Corman classics. I don't know if the world was clamoring for a remake of WASP WOMAN but we got it. Jennifer Rubin stars as the owner of a cosmetics company who starts to depend on the experimental work of an discredited doctor (Daniel J. Travanti) in order to maintain her youth. Hey, that is the exact same plot as CATWOMAN! Only this cost about $84 million less. Director Jim Wynorski fares well enough with this entry in his extensive filmography. The movie is filled with bad acting (most notably from Rubin), cheesy effects and bad dialogue. But it moves fast enough, contains plenty of nudity (courtesy of Maria Ford) and features some B-acting greats (Gerrit Graham, Jay Richardson). And, at the very least, you get to see Emmy award winner Travanti get attacked by a big wasp that used to be his pet cat.

An aging model/cosmetics executive (Jennifer Rubin) finds a way to reverse the aging process through an experimental wasp drug, but it has deadly consequences as she morphes from time to time into a giant man eating wasp.

Much better then you would expect remake of the original Roger Corman camp classic, though this remake is dead serious. It features a very appealing turn by Jennifer Rubin, and actually focuses more on characterization then cheap scares (even though it does have its share of them). However, the film does feature poor monster effects.

Rated R; Nudity, Violence, Sexual Situations, and Profanity.

The Wasp Woman (1995)

I was up late one night, and The Wasp Woman was on TV. It was from Roger Corman, so I thought why not. It wasn't exactly a waste of time, and was entertaining. It is about a lady who is beginning to get to old to model for her skincare company, so she resorts to Dr. Zinthorp, who has a creation made of wasp DNA that reverses the aging process. She tests it on herself, and it begins to have some crazy side effects. The monster effects are cheesy and cheap, but it isn't too bad of a movie. I give it a 7 out of 10.

The Wasp Woman (1995) was a made-for-cable version of the original 1960 classic B-movie. Well, this was made for pay cable but the film-makers didn't focus enough on the adult aspect of the story-line. Instead they tried to make a cheesy sci-fi/horror film with enough glad handing and back slapping to make this one unenjoyable. This remake was a lot better than the one made several years before, but it still is missing something. I mean you have a decent director Jim Wynorski and an attractive lead actress, plus the theme of the film. I don't know. Maybe I was hoping too much for an actual movie that delivers the goods.

Well, it was a decent made-for-cable-t.v. movie. But it could have been so much better. Believe me it could have. Who knows, maybe three times the charm!

Slightly recommended.