Dynamixor
The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.
CrawlerChunky
In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.
classicsoncall
At least a couple of Sixties teen heart throbs had the good sense not to venture into the sequel to "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine". Can you just picture Frankie Avalon and Dwayne Hickman conspiring to turn this over to buddy Fabian? He's probably still kicking himself.However nothing must have scared Vincent Price, an actor who spent a good deal of his own time scaring movie audiences with stuff like "House on Haunted Hill" and "Tales of Terror". In it's own way, I guess 'Girl Bombs' is scary too; once you see it you'll be clawing the walls for a week until your nervous system settles down.As bad as the first movie was, if you were paying attention you might have been amused by the Annette Funicello and Harvey Lembeck cameos, and a handful of sight gags that made the effort a little bit of fun. With those two Italian goofballs Franco and Ciccio, this was just tedious. But you know what - I gave it a shot. Having slogged my way through the picture, I can be confidently assured that for the rest of my life, I'll never have to see it again.
The_Void
Mario Bava is one of my all time favourite directors, and Vincent Price is one of my all time favourite actors; so despite the fact that I didn't like Dr Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine at all, I still felt almost as if catching this needless sequel was a duty I had to fulfil. Before making this film, Bava had already directed a number of classics including Black Sabbath, Black Sunday and The Whip and The Body, while Vincent Price had completed his work on Roger Corman's Poe Anthology along with several other classic films. I can only assume, therefore, that the pair had decided to take a break from making good films as this is a million miles away from the best that the two men can do! Well, either that or they both just wanted to spend some time with scantily clad ladies, and I can't really blame them if that was the case! Anyway, the plot has something to do with dubious 'assassin' Dr Goldfoot building an army of robot bombs that look like pretty girls (will be familiar to Austin Powers fans!), and he uses them to eliminate some of Nato's world leaders...or something.Mario Bava's best work was in the horror genre and as such a lot of what I like about his directorial style is relative to the genre; but he has proved on many occasions that he's capable of delivering good films in other genres, but you'd be forgiven for thinking otherwise based on this film! There is a lot of nonsense happening in the movie and this undoubtedly distracts from the directing; but it's clear that Bava wasn't really trying. What a shame that this is the only film he and the great Vincent Price made together! The film was obviously intended to be funny; but all the humour if of the very goofy variety and I honestly did not laugh even once during the film. At a struggle, I could only really think of two good things to say about this film; one is that Vincent Price is entertaining (although he could read out a recipe book and it would be entertaining) and the other is that some of the girls featured are nice to look at. The first Dr Goldfoot film was terrible, and this one is worse. They couldn't even think of a catchy jingle to go over the title sequence! I wouldn't recommend this movie to even hardcore Bava and Price fans...
Bogmeister
MASTER PLAN: blow up key U.S. generals with booby-trapped girl robots. The diabolical Dr. Goldfoot is back, in this sequel to "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine"(65). No lie! How they talked Vincent Price into this, I'm not sure, though he was already hamming it up in the previous movie. Here he's joined by a couple of comics who were Italy's answer to Abbott & Costello. Teen heartthrob Fabian replaces teen heartthrob Frankie Avalon as an agent of S.I.C., oh, yes! Rather than simple theft, which he indulged in previously, here Goldfoot teams with the Chinese for probable world domination (those dastardly Chinese - see also "Battle Beneath the Earth" which came out around the same time). Goldfoot explains all this by speaking directly to the audience, breaking that 4th wall. He still uses a machine which manufactures female robots, all dressed in golden bathing suits and boots, which he sends to kiss various generals; an intense enough smooch sets off an explosion. The only general left standing is Goldfoot's double. All this is kind of incidental; the main plot has the two main leads/buffoons improbably/accidentally join up with S.I.C. as agents.Goldfoot, of course, is a broad parody of the outrageous villains from the James Bond films. He has a swimming pool of killer fish, probably something like piranha, so, every now and then, a skeleton turns up, freshly cleaned. This also copies "Our Man Flint" a bit, with the latest IBM computer (Rita) sabotaged by Goldfoot when it selects the best agents for the job. The two comedians are not very subtle, with over-the-top mugging, and a lot of the action is sped up (undercranked) to give it that slapstick silent comedy feeling. Otherwise, much of the humor falls flat, though it does pick up near the end. I've written that the previous Goldfoot movie was the most ridiculous parody of the Bond craze, but this Italian take on the whole thing takes it to yet another level. The final half-hour gives a new meaning to the term 'absurdity,' involving a balloon trip by the heroes which touches off of heaven at one point and then chases down a supersonic jet plane! Laura Antonelli figures prominently in these last few scenes; she became a somewhat famous sex symbol in Italian sex farces in the seventies. My DVD version was in Italian, with optional English subtitles. Heroes:3 Villain:4 Femme Fatales:5 Henchmen:2 Fights:2 Stunts/Chases:3 Gadgets:3 Auto:2 Locations:3 Pace:3 overall:3
bensonmum2
Mario Bava is responsible for some of my all-time favorite movies. Black Sunday, Kill Baby…Kill, Danger: Diabolik, Black Sabbath, and Blood and Black Lace are all in my top 100. I guess you could call me a Bava fanboy. As far as I'm concerned, Mario Bava was a genius and one of the greatest directors ever. I even love the movie that Bava considered his worst – Five Dolls for an August Moon. However, if he thought of Five Dolls for an August Moon as his worst then (as I wrote in my comment for that movie) "I guess Bava never had the misfortune of watching his movie Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs". I take it that there are some difference between the Italian version and the American version, but I doubt they'd change my opinion much. Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs is just that – a complete and utter BOMB of a movie. Other than Vincent Price's gleeful performance as Dr. Goldfoot, I can't think of another positive thing to mention. The plot is ridiculous. The acting is abysmal. The comedy, especially on the part of the two Italian buffoons Franco Franchi and Ciccio Ingrassia (maybe it's a cultural thing), isn't funny at all. The music is terrible. The final chase scene is noteworthy for being just so incredibly stupid. And there are none of the Bava directorial trademarks or flourishes that I've come enjoy. And to top it all off, the dubbing is simply atrocious. I normally don't complain too much about dubbing, but in this case the whole movie has a hollow, staged sound to it. In the end, Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs is so bad that it makes Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (the first of the two Goldfoot movies) look like a masterpiece of cinema (which it most definitely isn't). As much as I hate to do it, I've got to give this Mario Bava film a 2/10.
