Independent Films, Film Profiles

Zaat

Zaat, also known as The Blood Waters of Dr. Z or Hydra, is a 1975 cult movie that gained significant exposure when it was used in an episode of movie-mocking television seriesMystery Science Theater 3000 in May 1999. Currently, the movie is ranked as one of the five worst movies of all time on IMDb.[2]The film begins with Nazi mad scientist Dr. Kurt Leopold in his lab, where he has lived alone for about twenty years. He is comtemplating about his former colleagues' laughter at his formula (described as "ZaAt" — read Z-sub-A, A-sub-T — but which he simply calls "Zaat"). His formula can turn a man into a walking catfish. He injects himself with the serum. He proceeds to climb into a basket above a tank of Zaat and lowers himself in. After a few minutes, a man-sized catfish-human hybrid creature climbs out of the tank, looks in the mirror, and remarks that it is beautiful what he has done to himself.His first act of revenge on society that he feels has wronged him is to release several smaller walking catfish around the town's lakes and river (filmed in the St. Johns River near Green Cove Springs, FL), an annoyance to the townspeople. He then releases Zaat into the local water supply, rendering many of the townspeople ill.Leopold decides to kill the colleagues that laughed at his work. In his lab, he has a zodiac wheel, which he uses to symbolically record events. On it, he places a picture of one colleague, Maxson, noting that Maxson's days are numbered. In a lake where Maxson is fishing, Leopold swims under Maxson's boat, overturns it. He proceeds to kill Maxson and Maxson's son. Maxson's wife escapes, although she is in shock from the attack.After killing Maxson, Leopold discovers a girl who is camping out alone on the shore of the lake. He approaches her, only to be deterred by her barking dog. Leopold is not afraid of the dog, however he doesn't wish the girl to be alerted to his presence. The girl carries on with her business, unconcerned about the barking dog. Leopold retreats. He knows that he cannot sneak ashore, and he will need to attempt to meet her some other time. Leopold never comments on what he wants with her.Leopold has a grudge with another colleague, Ewing. He fastens Ewing's picture on the zodiac wheel, and proceeds to kill Ewing at night in his own house.His two colleagues now deceased, Leopold returns to the lake where the girl is still camping. He waits for an opportunity to abduct her. His perseverance pays off when she strips down to a yellow bikini to go swimming. She dives into the lake, swimming carefree until suddenly Leopold catches her underwater. He grabs her ankle, but she manages to struggle loose and desperately tries to reach the surface, with Leopold close behind. Although she manages to reach the surface and scream, her signal for help is futile and short-lived. Leopold knows that she is camping alone, and there is no one near to help. He simply comes up behind her and clamps his massive hand over her mouth. This silences her, and he then pulls her underwater. There he has the advantage because he can breathe underwater, and she cannot. He swims with her to his lab, even as she struggles in vain to escape.At the lab, the bikini-clad girl is lying strapped down in a basket next to the large tank of Zaat. She is unconscious, and Leopold is at a bench drawing a sketch of her face. He puts the sketch on the zodiac wheel next to a sketch of him to show that she is to be his mate.Leopold stands over her with a syringe full of Zaat. She wakes up screaming. Leopold, clamps his clawed hand over her face to silence her and injects the Zaat into her neck. The girl passes out. Leopold finalizes the arrangements to make the girl his mate. As the basket is hoisted above the Zaat tank, the girl wakes up and is dunked into the tank while kicking and screaming. She continues to struggle under the surface. An alarm sounds, and the girl stops struggling. The basket is hauled out of the tank. Her body, partially transformed, lies still, and she stares ahead with dead, empty eyes. Leopold smashes some equipment in a fit of rage.Having calmed down, Leopold goes to the zodiac wheel, and disgustedly snatches her picture off it. He crumples it up, and tosses it into a vat of acid, thus dissolving it. He then removes the girl's, now pitiful, outstretched frame lying inert in death and, carrying her body like a rag doll, places it in the vat of acid, where it is totally dissolved.Leopold attempts to kidnap another mate: his choice is Martha Walsh, the lovely female member of a scientific team sent to investigate the weird happenings in the town (caused by Dr. Leopold). He draws a sketch of her and puts it next to his on the wheel. Leopold grabs her after her male counterparts leaves her alone. Leopold takes her to his lab, but two of her companions are waiting there, and Leopold kills them violently. He injects her with Zaat, readies her to be dunked into the tank, and makes his getaway, with canisters of Zaat. Martha's transformation does not go as planned, she does not get dunked into the tank. Then she follows Leopold trance-like into the sea.Her boyfriend tries to stop her, but she pays no heed. The movie ends ambiguously, with Leopold seen shot but not killed.