Once again we see that, in the tradition of Carrie, Repulsion, The Brain That Wouldn’t Die and Rosemary’s Baby, men make the best “feminist” art:
First up is THE WASP WOMAN, a Corman-directed/Leo Gordon-scripted effort presumably inspired by the-then success of THE FLY. Susan Cabot (WAR OF THE SATELLITES) stars as Janice Starlin, the 40-something owner of a glamorous New York cosmetic firm. She learns that her fading beauty is not only harming her personal life but also causing her business to dip. She gets wrapped up with nutty, aging scientist Eric Zinthrop (Michael Mark, familiar to monster movie fans for his appearances in FRANKENSTEIN and SON OF FRANKENSTEIN) who has developed a new serum from the enzymes of wasps (or is it bees?), transforming aging skin back to youthful beauty. Janice takes the treatments and she starts to appear much younger, but the formula changes her personality. Slowly, the lecherous nature of the queen wasp asserts itself inside her. She now turns into a black bug-eyed creature with pipe cleaners sticking out of her head and oven mitts on her hands.
