When Genres (Seriously) Collide

Jesse James Meets
Frankenstein's Daughter

1966

It's so obvious, isn't it, that after all that calamity over there in Europe caused by Dr. Frankenstein, the family would eventually relocate to America's desert southwest region. Duh. Now it's time for his granddaughter (not daughter) to carry on with his evil experiments. At one point Dr. Maria Frankenstein does refer to her experiments as the ones her father did only on paper after his father before him. So technically she is Frankenstein's daughter but not the Frankenstein's daughter. Oi.

In any case, with all the lightning in the southwest, Maria figures this is the place to be -- much better chance to harness the electricity needed for bringing to life a minnion for evil deeds. Unfortunately, all her Mexican subjects were dying on her. She was not having much success until the legendary thought-to-be-dead Jesse James is at her door looking for a place to hideout for awhile. With him is his sidekick who is a linebacker-sized hulk of a man who was shot and needs medical attention. Little does he know he'd soon have a brain transplant and would be used for experimentation of the ultra-dastardly kind.

After a quick setup at the Frankenstein laboratory, the film shifts to western mode for awhile before careening back into sci-fi. The portrayal of Jesse James was horrendous and the technical sci-fi aspects of the picture were obviously made with a budget that probably hardly exceeded four figures. Additionally the acting and writing were both lousy.

It's clear this picture wasn't made as a serious film. This was purely drive-in make-out fodder. Does that excuse it from being tripe? No. Because it's not trying to parody or to be comedy, it comes off as just pointless, terribly made garbage.