The Double-D Avenger

I'll freely admit I didn't listen to this film. I watched it all, but immediately jumped to Briggs' commentary track, rather than subject myself to 90 minutes of incomprehensible dialogue and circus music.

The backstory is far more interesting than the actual story: Pervy filmmaker William Winckler hired three former Russ Meyer vixens (Kitten Natividad, Haji, and Raven De La Croix), and got them together to make a horrifically awful sexploitation flick, wherein Natividad becomes a superhero called The Double-D Avenger. That's all you need to know about the plot, believe me. Briggs has more of the rich, rich analysis than I could ever dream of offering, so pay the man some heed.

Even Briggs can't explain why Winckler hired stars from the sixties for his film, why the evil wenches use hair dryers-cum-water guns as weapons (and why that water turns into shaving cream), why lemonade is the Avenger's kryptonite, or why, especially, this film was ever made. A 78 minute behind the scenes documentary may shed some light on this, but you'd have to be a masochist to sit through it. Lord knows I didn't.

The biggest mystery of all, though, is why there are no breast shots in this film. (Or rather, video; it's shot (very badly) on digital.) There's a handful of 'em in a flashback, and they are all photos of pinup photographs. None of the stars ever disrobe, not even Sheri Dawn Thomas, whose lines always begin with the phrase "ooga boobies!"

Elite Entertainment has either done a great service or the work of the devil in uniting this film with Briggs, but for now I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. It's so bad it's gone back to good and back to bad again, and even Elite doesn't do much to salvage matters: During the (very) few moments where Briggs isn't talking, the volume on the feature never comes up -- even though he's exhorting us to listen to a particularly juicy piece of dialogue.

Awful movie. Excellent commentary. Don't miss it.