There are two different editions of THE LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS available from Legend Films. One, already reviewed here at Corazine, boasts a sharp colorization job as well as Mike Nelson of Mystery Science Theater 3000 lobbing jokes at the movie on the commentary track. The other version of THE LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, which I’m reviewing here, lacks the colorized film but includes a commentary track by not just Mr. Nelson but also Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett, fellow MST3K cohorts. B king Roger Corman’s infamous low-budget quickie – notoriously shot as an afterthought when there was a couple days’ worth of budget left after the completion of another film – lends itself to the making-funnery made so famous by the MST3K guys. Poor schmuck Seymour breeds (dunno if that’s the right word; my wife, a botanist, isn’t handy) a new kind of plant, a hybrid whose genetics include the Venus fly trap. Except now Seymour has got a Venus HUMAN trap on his hands. The tragedy of this story is really almost Shakespearean. Seymour, poor bastard, is in love with the gorgeous, if dingy, Audrey – he even names his killer plant after her (not that he knew it was killer when he bred [?] it). Alas, their romance and happily ever after is star-crossed. It’s apparently Seymour’s destiny to accidentally kill other poor bastards and then feed them to his demanding (read: whiny) plant (“FEED ME! I’M HUNGRY!”), I mean, since they’re already dead and such – no reason to let good food go to waste … ? Anyway, we all know the story and how this meager and meek little film (which sported a cameo by a young Jack Nicholson) inspired a stage musical which in turn inspired a feature film. This cult classic here gets the full riff-into-it treatment by the Nelson-Murphy-Corbett team. It’s hard to say which version to get. Some of the jokes are recycled (I mean they pop up on both Legend Films’ editions of THE LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS). What it really comes down to is COLORIZED versus THE WHOLE TEAM. You can get the one with the handsome colorization and Mike Nelson’s commentary, or you can go sans color but get Nelson AND Murphy and Corbett. Or, if you’re a big enough fan, you could always go for both?
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