Director: Denis Sanders
Writers: Nicholas Meyer, Sylvia Schneble
Producer: unknown
Cast: William Smith, Victoria Vetri, Anitra Ford, Cliff Osmond, Ben Hammer, Sid Kaiser, Wright King, Anna Aries, Beverly Powers, Andre Philippe, Katie A. Saylor, William Keller, Cliff Emmich, Jack Perkins, Danielle DuPont, Mary Sweeney, Amanda Jeffries, Sharon Madigan, Rene Bond, Cathy Hilton, Susie Player, Al Burdiggi, Tom Pittman, Mickey Caruso, Herb Robbins, Gregg White, F. Stewart Wilson, John Nelson, Dick Murphy, Lloyd McLinn, Don Hall, Steve Lefkowitz, and uncredited actors Colleen Brennan, Christopher Jeffries, Lynn Lemon
The State Department’s Office of Security sends Special Agent Neil Agar (William Smith) to investigate a series of deaths happening to employees of the federally funded Brandt Research lab in Peckham, California. The victims are all men and seem to have expired from sexual exhaustion. As the fatalities continue to occur to other locals, the town is quarantined as Agar confers with scientists at the lab to determine the cause of the strange deaths.
The Flashback Fanatic movie review
I love it when a film uses an outrageous exploitation hook to get our attention and then tries to justify it as a legitimate basis for a storyline; if it works you get some terrific and probably cult status entertainment. This is a film that shamelessly flaunts its exploitation aims with its title, its content, and its genre with an added bit of humor regarding the still ticklish subject of sex in the increasingly permissive era of the '70s. This permissiveness is shown to be spreading all throughout society. It is not just the young and hip anti-establishment that is messing around here. Often it is middle-aged blue-collar workers and government employees that are getting it on and getting offed.
Invasion of the Bee Girls has the novelty of its threat being quite different from the science fiction film invasions that had come before, if you’ll pardon the expression. The '50s sci-fi fright flicks had conditioned the audience to expect giant mutant monsters and attacks from outer space. Here the '70s drive-in crowd was getting the budget-conscious movie menace of beautiful women providing the edgy thrills of nudity, sex, and death. That it is also venting anxiety about loosening sexual mores and/or relishing promiscuity makes this a film that is saavy about both what its audience wants and of the changing times.
A scene that I find is not just a setup for some cheap laughs but actually quite honest and unaffected is the small town meeting. Sheriff Peters (Cliff Osmond), Dr. Murger (Wright King) of the Brandt Research lab, and government agent Neil Agar are briefing the citizens. As the sexual details about the local deaths are expressed, there are laughs among the attending locals. When the citizens are asked to abstain from sex during this crisis, one crude loudmouth (Jack Perkins) proclaims his defiance by proudly stating that he will continue to fornicate with or without his wife. This scene plays as an irreverent variation on the exposition and advice delivered by the authorities to citizens in sci-fi flicks of the past.
The most intimidating '70s movie tough guy of them all, William Smith, stars as hero Neil Agar (probably referencing '50s sci-fi film icon John Agar). He seems like a no-nonsense type of government agent that can still be civil. A nice bit is his apologetic overture to the stressed Sheriff Peters to maintain mutual respect and cooperation for solving the strange mystery. Of course, even when William Smith plays a nice guy, he still needs to kick some ass.
Anitra Ford is the cool and slinky brunette playing entomologist Dr. Susan Harris. She was most famous as a model on the game show The Price is Right. Ford also appeared as the villainous Amazon Ahnjayla in 1974’s Wonder Woman. That was a one-off television movie starring Cathy Lee Crosby a year before Lynda Carter became synonymous with the superheroine in a revamped and successful TV series.
Perhaps the most amusing but unlikable character is Herb Kline (Ben Hammer). He is the horny Brandt Research scientist that is cracking jokes about his deceased colleague and lusting after aloof and beautiful fellow scientist Dr. Susan Harris. We lose all sympathy for Kline when he sneaks away for a round of hanky-panky with Dr. Harris despite having his magnificent wife Nora (Anna Aries) waiting at home. In another nod to the sexual permissiveness of the times, Kline actually flaunts his infidelity to the amusement of our hero Neil Agar.
Cliff Osmond’s Sheriff Peters would be a likely contender for the National Law Enforcement Officer of the Year Award. He goes above and beyond the call of duty with superhuman willpower resisting the charms of superhumanly sexy Anna Aries as a newly transformed Bee Girl.
Even hidden behind large sunglasses and a loose lounging robe, Anna Aries’ allure is pheromonally phenomenal. Seeing her statuesque form lovingly slathered in transformation enabling goop by other Bee Girls is the sci-fi stuff wet dreams are made of. Her filmography is frustratingly brief and her background seems as mysterious as the Bee Girls themselves.
There are also plenty of other Bee Girl beauties in Dr. Harris’ hive to keep buzzing our libidos. Beverly Powers, Katie A. Saylor, Colleen Brennan, Mary Sweeney, Amanda Jeffries, Sharon Madigan, Renee Bond, and Cathy Hilton contribute to a sexy line-up that is the best special effect any exploitation movie could ask for.
As Brandt Research librarian Julie Zorn, Victoria Vetri also has her beauty put on display. The 1968 Playboy Playmate of the Year had quite a few television and film roles in her résumé, but she is probably best known for flaunting her fine physique as a cave girl in When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth (1970). Vetri was also quite good (credited as Angela Dorian) in a small and down to earth role as Terry in the horror classic Rosemary’s Baby (1968). In that film her character is told that she looks like the actress Victoria Vetri.
Although my frustration of never having been seduced by a Bee Girl is tempered by the comfort of not having been screwed to death, this film still leaves me with a few other nagging quibbles. The origination of the Bee Girl menace is rather vague. Dr. Susan Harris is the mistress of this bee girl hive, yet it is unclear just what her objectives were with the mad science employed here. Just how agent Agar ever fixates on some sort of mutation phenomenon as the possible culprit for the killings is not ever clearly explained. I guess that he just somehow intuits that a research facility full of geneticists and entomologists must somehow result in lethal human mating habits. Finally, the climax seems a bit too abrupt. One well-placed bullet sure causes a lot of convenient and catastrophic chaos.
The horror genre is often touching upon themes of sex and death. Invasion of the Bee Girls is entirely devoted to those aspects. Its timely relevance in the swinging '70s also makes it seem a little satirical. Despite a few nits to pick, this film’s simplicity, originality, wit, and pulchritude are just enough honey to keep this B-film fan buzzing.
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