Produced by Howard Ziehm and Bill Osco, seasoned porno producers (Mona The Virgin Nymph, Hollywood Blue, and hundreds of porno loops) in the days when pornographic cinema was a hot new trend (Deep Throat came out in 1972 and practically invented an entire industry), Flesh Gordon was something of a phenomenon back in 1974, a cult hit in college towns all over the country.

Sex Ray Bombards Earth!
Earth is being bombarded by a mysterious "sex ray," beamed from the planet Porno, causing citizens to rip off their clothes and have at it with anybody within arm's reach. Though I can think of worse things to happen, our hero Flesh, a rogue scientist named Flexi Jerkoff and Flesh's new gal-pal Dale Ardor blast off into outer space to put a stop to the naughtiness. Crash-landing on Porno, they meet a wacky cast of characters, including the drag queen leader of planet Porno, Emperor Wang, Prince Precious, leader of a band of mincing gay warriors, and Queen Nellie and her topless Amazons. There's also a menagerie of fierce beasts like the Penisaurus and a gaggle of Raping Robots.

You get the idea. If the word "penis" still makes you giggle and blush, Flesh Gordon will produce plenty of raucous laughter. Wang's army wears penis-shaped helmets, the robots have penises that spin like a drill, and the sex ray machine is shaped like ... a penis! If you're an 11-year-old boy, you'll probably want to watch it twice. Anyone else will be quickly bored. The sight gags and stupid jokes occasionally stick, but one funny joke out of 20 is not a particularly satisfying ratio.

Impressive Special Effects
Flesh Gordon is certainly not without its charms. Some of the special effects are astonishingly good for a scraped-together movie like this. Stop-motion masters like Jim Danforth and an uncredited Dennis Muren (who went on to revolutionize the field at Industrial Light & Magic) do some truly fine work here and, if the film has any wit at all, it's in the often-impressive art direction, penises notwithstanding. Some of the images are downright lovely, especially the nymphomaniac Queen Amora's swan-shaped spaceship drifting through the moonlit sky.

Originally conceived as a hardcore film, Flesh Gordon ran into more than a little legal trouble during its production (the cops ought to have an editing credit — they sat in the editing room with the producers and supervised the removal of explicit material, taking the offending frames with them). The result barely qualifies as softcore. There are plenty of bare breasts, vague simulated sex, and off-color jokes, but Futurama is more erotic than this.

Stitched together from both 16mm and 35mm footage, the film's seams are only too apparent on DVD. Many scenes look like they were shot with a lens smeared with, er, something. The print itself, though probably the best one available, is in pretty bad shape, with deep emulsion scratches and sloppy splices. The box boasts that this edition includes 15 minutes of restored footage, but there's no indication anywhere on the disc itself as to what (or where) the restored footage is.

The DVD offers scene access divided into only eight chapters (DVD pet peeve: movies divided into less than 12 chapters), and includes the original theatrical trailer. The making of Flesh Gordon was a long, torturous process, described in numbing detail by co-producer/co-director Howard Ziehm in his audio commentary. Ziehm has a unique take on one of the more obscure and unexplored side-trips of the movie industry, but his commentary is self-aggrandizing and stiffly read from a cliche-ridden script. He's got some wild, bawdy tales of life on the ragged edge of the industry, more than enough for an autobiographical version of Boogie Nights, but it'd be nice to hear from some other cast and crew members, too.

Fitfully amusing, and only mildly bawdy, Flesh Gordon: The Collectors Edition may satisfy your inner horny teenager, but its days as a "cult classic" are far behind.