Dr. Phibes Rises Again / Dr. Goldfoot And The Bikini Machine
Mahoning Drive-In Theater - Lehighton, PA
The only bright side to the sun setting so early in October is that they can book a Sunday night double feature and I can still get home in plenty of time to get a good night's sleep before work on Monday morning.
Mahoning Drive-In Theater - Lehighton, PA
The only bright side to the sun setting so early in October is that they can book a Sunday night double feature and I can still get home in plenty of time to get a good night's sleep before work on Monday morning.
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| Show banner designed by Andrew Kern |
Beth hit it out of the park with the special concession food. Vincent Price and his wife Mary published a cookbook in 1965 called A Treasury Of Great Recipes. One of the recipes in this book is Dutch Meatballs, so she cooked up a batch inspired by The Merchant of Menace himself.
Here is the recipe if you want to cook some up for yourself.
The first movie of the night was the 1972 horror comedy Dr. Phibes Rises Again. This film was the sequel to the 1971 film The Abominable Dr. Phibes, which I know I have seen, but I can't say that I remember anything about it and I didn't know that it had a sequel before this double feature was announced.
This was my first time seeing Dr. Phibes Rises Again, and to say that it wasn't my kind of movie would be an understatement. Some of the visuals were pretty cool, and the print that they got was gorgeous, but the movie itself made me feel like I was watching a bad soap opera. I'm not going to say anything else out of respect for one of my favorite actors, but this film is going to be a one-and-done for me.
Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine is not at all the kind of film that I ever have in mind when I think of Vincent Price. It's a slapstick spy comedy from 1965 that reminded me a little bit of Get Smart, but with a heavier emphasis on physical gags and chase scenes. Price plays Dr. Goldfoot, who has created an army of female robots that seem to have been the inspiration behind Dr. Evil's fembots from the Austin Powers movies that hit theaters three decades later. These robots are bulletproof and have been programmed with knowledge which helps them to find and marry rich men so that they can steal their assets and bring them back to the evil doctor.
The two protagonists in this film are played by singer Frankie Avalon and actor Dwayne Hickman, who is best known for his role as Dobie Gillis, and the theme song at the start of the film was performed by The Supremes. I'm not sure how well it would play in front of a modern audience, but I thought it was pretty funny. This film also spawned a sequel the following year which was directed by Mario Bava of all people. I cannot confirm nor deny that this was played as a secret feature at the end of the night because I had to get home and get a good night's sleep for work.
At the risk of sounding negative, I prefer the movies that were screened last October for Vincent Price Twice II. The Masque Of The Red Death and Theater Of Blood were two of the best movies that I ever saw for the first time on the lot. This year's double feature started off with a clunker and ended with a comedy that was very funny, but not really what I look forward to for this event in particular. I'm still glad to have had the opportunity to see them both on the big screen, especially with such pristine 35mm prints as the ones that were shown, but I'm hoping next year's double feature is a little closer to what we got to see in 2023.
