Please Don't Eat My Mother

Please Don't Eat My Mother is a pretty solid example of 1970's sleaze, in this case attempting to evoke the feel of a Mel Brooks genre parody as the main engine to drive the semi-related sex scenes. The star (who doesn't appear in sex scenes) even looks like Mel Brooks. Typically, it features a familiar plot and setting borrowed from a mainstream picture.

In this case, the source material is "Little Shop of Horrors"

NUDITY REPORT

Various women appear in sex and strip acts. All of them show at least full-frontal nudity, some even more explicit genital close-ups.

Rene Bond provides full-frontal nudity as the plant's final victim, while various other minor players filled the other victim roles.

The general plot: lonely voyeur Henry Fudd lives with his mother, and buys a plant for companionship after he realizes that the plant can speak (but only to Henry). The carnivorous plant keeps demanding larger and larger meals, eventually requiring human beings. Henry keeps providing, either by luring prostitutes to the house or by kidnapping young couples at gunpoint. Somewhere along the way, the plant chows down on Henry's mother, although he doesn't seem to mind that much, expressing about the same level of regret that you'd express if your favorite puppy chewed a good shoe.

DVD info from Amazon.

no widescreen, but a very clear and crisp, digitally remastered 1.33
The DVD contains a ton of extras - several x-rated trailers for other films produced by Harry Novak, full-length commentary by Novak, three archival short films, and a gallery of the original print ads for some of Novak's trashier films.

The star, Buck Kartalian, was a legitimate theater performer who also appeared as a character actor with bit parts in many legitimate films (Planet of the Apes, Mister Roberts, The Outlaw Josie Wales, Cool Hand Luke, e.g.), making him one of the very few actors ever to maintain simultaneous careers in mainstream entertainment and exploitation fare. Now 78, he still works regularly in his familiar bit parts.

The female star is Rene Bond, a hardcore and softcore star in the 70's, who frequently teamed up on screen with her real-life partner, Ric Lutze, as she did in this movie. They became part of bad cinema history when they teamed up in Necromania, the last film ever directed by the notorious schlockmeister, Ed Wood, Jr.

Actually, that's an interesting story if you're into the history of bad films. Necromania was thought to be lost until recently, when 43 minutes of the original footage was unearthed. You can find it here, at Movies Unlimited

Miss Bond made about 75 adult films in the 70's, but both she and Lutze vanished from the sex film scene in 1978 and have remained anonymous ever since.

The Critics Vote

no major reviews.

The People Vote ...

With their votes ... IMDB summary: IMDb voters score it a lame 3.7

IMDb guideline: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence, about like three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, about like two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, about like two stars from the critics. Films under five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film, equivalent to about one and a half stars from the critics or less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

My own guideline: A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. C means it will only appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover appeal. D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre. F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Based on this description, this film is a C. A solid entry in the softcore exploitation genre, but not a mainstream film.