Good thing I'm not a customer
A totally stupid movie I almost rented twice in one day – it's also available under the title Dr. Gore, and the video store had that one too – Body Shop concerns a mad scientist who kidnaps and cuts up women to assemble his dream girl. Along with the assistance of a hunchback, he...hey, déjà vu!
Written and directed by J. G. Patterson, Jr. (J. G. Patterson, Sr. must be so proud) It's "Rated R by King Of Video", which tells us even less than if it were rated R by the MPAA. Here, I'll tell ya what you're in store for – an incredibly dull series of this doctor's first (and last) dates with these girls, interrupted by fairly infrequent (and, though gross, quite routine) dismemberment scenes.
Patterson himself (referred to as "America's No. 1 Magician" in the opening credits...what, no Doug Henning?) and his Robin Williams-like hairy arms stars as the doc, and he's so bad it's like watching cement trying to emote. His attempts at creating his dream girl start with the amusingly stupid (wrapping a body in aluminum foil and running electrical current through it) to the inexplicable (he never hints at what one girl's torso is perfect, but he needs someone else's legs). This guy may be America's no. 1 magician, but he's not much of a doctor, using a hacksaw to cut through skin, and a scalpel to cut through bone.
All the attention to detail that you'd expect is here, like that body who just won't stop blinking. ("I hope it's a nice fresh one" indeed!) The editing is choppy, and the awful, annoying music is supposed to be to the tune of "That's What Little Girls Are Made Of" but it sounds like "These Are A Few Of My Favorite Things" in 13/8 time.
The only thing that keeps this movie from being total crap is the funny ending, starting in the instant playing of a wedding march when this patchwork girl comes to life, and into the "tragic" end in which the doc learns that you can brainwash a woman into believing she loves you but she'll still probably leave you for some fat delivery guy. And then leave him for a truck driver. And so on. Oh, and there's a cute bunny rabbit, who turns up for one shot early in the film, and reappears near the end. He's so cute!
It's hard to miss the super-lurid box art on this one – all sorts of blood-dripping female body parts hung up on meathooks – so you should know just which one to avoid.
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