A comedy of splendiferous shabbiness, whipped by Roger Corman, notoriously, over the course of two days around the remains of a set and the idea, brought along from A Bucket of Blood, of the artist devoured by his art. Dick Miller is back to order a bouquet of carnations and season them with salt ("I'll eat 'em here"); the schmuck-artiste role this time falls to Jonathan Haze, who makes a living tripping over things in Mushnick's Skid Row flower shop. Mushnick (Mel Welles) is ready to send Haze out the door, when the putz brings in his new prized botanic experiment, a tiny hybrid christened Audrey, Jr. after the film's sweet mock-ingenue (Jackie Joseph). The plant wilts until it tastes blood, then it grows "like a cold sore from the lip;" clients start pouring in, but more nourishment is demanded by the creature itself, who whines "Feed meeeee. I'm hungryyyyyy." What Audrey wants Audrey gets, so Haze goes from squeezing blood out of his digits to collecting chunks from folks who keep dying around him. The Society of Silent Flower Watches soon turns up to see the grown plant, along with detectives Wally Campo and Jack Warford, prattling in hard-boiled clips for the spoof of Dragnet sangfroid, one of a thousand gags lovingly cultivated in Charles B. Griffith's screenplay. Others proliferate from "sick" humor to New York-ethnic humor to casual surrealism, Haze's face popping from inside a toilet before emerging as one of the victims' mugs imprinted on Audrey, Jr.'s macabre blossoming, though Corman's zest makes sure everything is encased in the first take to lock in freshness. The bareness of the situation encourages the free-floating inspiration of the ensemble, basking in the gentle sardonicism and absurdist wit -- Myrtie Vail as Haze's hypochondriac Ma toasting with cough syrup, Welles oy-ing over the "meshuga plant," dentist John Herman challenging Haze to a drill duel, and, most spectacularly, the squeaky, bow-tied Jack Nicholson giggling over Pain magazines before jumping onto the dentist's chair, sans novocaine ("Oh, goody goody, here it comes!"). In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce
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