You know you’re in for an, um, “distinctive” film-watching experience, when you flick on a flick and it displays the wrong credits following the title.  But, yup, that’s what you’ll experience when you take in (at least the American video print of) The Revenge Of Doctor X…also allegedly called The Double Garden…unless you find in on Wikipedia, where it’s listed as Venus Flytrap…and they inform readers the film is also known as The Body Of The Prey.

Not to be confused with 1932’s Doctor X or Doctor X releases in 1950, 1972 and 2012.  Or Humphrey Bogart’s 1939 outing, The Return Of Doctor X.

Did I mention, when you search The Revenge Of Doctor X on IMDb, it defaults to Mad Doctor Of Blood Island (1968) with the same erroneous credit as noted above?

You can just imagine what a treat it is to research and find a print of the film.  Tubi streamed the wrong-credits version then solved the name game dilemma by courageously putting their foot down and deleting it altogether.  The nerve of those people, omitting a movie I paid zero cents to watch!!!

This is where I should probably add that there is no character named “Doctor X.”  There is, however, a Doctor Bragan (James Craig), who may be the maddest mad scientist in the history of mad sciencetry.

I don’t mean he’s the craziest cat to ever peer down a microscope.  I mean his fuse is shorter than the left hind leg of a pygmy tsetse fly!

When not serving as Mayor Of Snap-Out City, Doctor Bragan is a NASA scientist having a crisis of confidence as his missile missions continue to miscue.  His concerned colleague, Dr. Paul Nakamura—whom Bragan nastily shouts at—recommends the round-eye take some R&R at Naka’s Japanese joint occupied by sister and fellow doctor Noriko Nakamura and a deformed dimwit.

Two more people to pop off at?  Bragan is buying in—and also buying a Venus flytrap plant to smuggle onboard the lengthy flight.  (Hence one of the titles.)

Between bouts of needlessly browbeating Noriko, the PO’d PhD becomes obsessed with creating a hybrid, combining the flytrap with a giant carnivorous plant residing at the bottom of the nearby bay.  Doc hires a bevy of beautiful topless babes to dive for the carnivore and…did you ask “Wait, why are they topless?”?  WHO CARES?  We just got a group of gorgeous near-naked lovelies on our screen, making Revenge 16.34 times better.  

(If you insist upon posing questions, ask “Why is a rocket scientist a world-class botanist?”)

Pretty Noriko puts up with a barrelful of Bragan’s temper tantrums, though the pair remains platonic.  At one point, Bragan actually apologizes to his hostess—then blasts her in the very next scene!

So, yeah, not only is the man mad as in irate, he’s now also mad as in nutzo a-go-go.

This does create opportunities to bark science-y stuff at his hybrid.  Some delightful dazzlers, too, including “You will become the most powerful thing on (sic) the universe!” and “Your mother was the earth; the rain, your blood; the lightning, your power!”

Say, they sound like the sort of lines you would hear in an Ed Wood movie.  Guess what—though uncredited in any version, the Revenge screenplay was allegedly penned by one Edward Wood.

Intriqued now? 

Some junkfilms really must be seen to be fully appreciated, words on a page not doing them full justice.  The Revenge Of Doctor X provides a few motivations.  One is for the scene that so unashamedly “resembles” a classic Thirties horror movie starring Boris Karloff as the monster, I gave Revenge my own title—Frankenplant.

Another reason is to get a good gander at the hybrid.  If you can picture a seven-foot carrot with a cross between boxing gloves and giant castanets for hands, you’re halfway there.  Just ignore the part about a sea creature surviving swimmingly on land…and growing feet.

(While you’re at it, ignore how Bragan is suddenly wearing a long leathery glove and forearm sleeve, attention is drawn to it, then it has no bearing on anything thereafter.)

But the top reason The Revenge Of Doctor X needs to be seen is to laugh, er, marvel at James Craig’s frequent-flip-out fest.  This is an actor who, in his heyday, performed on Broadway, auditioned for the Rhett Butler part in Gone With The Wind, was contracted to major studios including Columbia and Paramount, had a long-term deal with MGM for $2500 a week in the Forties (the modern equivalent of over $43,000), and reached the pinnacle of Hollywood success by appearing in a Three Stooges short.

Yet he seemingly lacked the sense to tone it down in Revenge—and apparently nobody instructed him to. It really is a sight to behold.  And a very loud one.

In fairness to Jimbo, he may have been simply doing what he was told.  Additionally, he could hardly be blamed for a script that called for constant scream sessions.  His career long on the skids by the time of the shoot, Craig may have felt it prudent not to make waves.

Regardless, The Revenge Of Doctor X remains remarkable, warrants much more attention in junkfilm circles, and can be seen—and especially heard—for FREE via the appropriately terrible prints available on YouTube and elsewhere.

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