SPOILERS INCLUDED
Could this really be the work of the same Derek Ford who made Diversions/Sex Express three years earlier? Sadly yes, assembling his first real 'name' cast since This, That and the Other in 1969 seems to have convinced Ford to make one of his most mainstream films with out and out comedy material taking the forefront and Ford's sexploitation past downplayed. But while ex-producing partner Stanley Long was able to make the jump from the sex documentary format of 'Naughty' to the audience pleasing 'Adventures of' comedies, Ford seemed too humourless and too into that Wife Swappers era of sex resulting in unwanted pregnancy, death, and misery to successfully reinvent himself as a comedy man. In fairness Ford's mid-Seventies sex comedies Commuter Husbands and The Sexplorer have their moments, but his attempts at creating a Xerox of the 'Confessions' series, in What's Up Nurse and this its sole sequel have the feel of unfunny and vulgar outbursts .
Taking place on bland sets that give the film the look of a poorly-moneyed sitcom What's Up Superdoc casts recently deceased TV actor Christopher Mitchell as a doctor who unknown even to himself is the 'Superdoc' the most fertile man in the world and who through sperm donation in his college years has fathered 837 children. A female doctor eventually tracks Mitchell down to break the news, and it's not long before he's 'unmasked' in the headlines as well. This elevates the portly, unattractive doctor to the unlikely level of a rock and roll sex god, women try to grab him in lifts, 'groupies' follow him around with test tubes hoping to get pregnant from a sperm donation, under the shadow of publicity his life becomes a misery.
To save him from being mobbed in the streets, Mitchell is put in the 24 hour protection of order-bellowing ex-sergeant major Goodwin (Harry H. Corbett) a nightmare character from the national service days. Corbett essentially holds Mitchell prisoner, forcing him to have as many 'cold baths' as possible and ejecting women with dodgy Swedish accents and exceptionally large breasts out of his apartment, much to Mitchell's resentment. Mitchell agrees to be a guest on Hughie Green's talk show, but his appearance proves disastrous when the 'family' entertainer's nasty side comes to the fore and Green has a foul mouthed outburst on air ('a joke' in the film, not entirely unbelievable in light of later revelations). Amidst the chaos Mitchell is kidnapped by ubiquitous movie heavy Milton Reid and Chic Murray from The Ups and Downs of a Handyman. They're cronies of a rich oil tycoon (Bill Pertwee whose 'Texan' accent is hopefully one of the film's intentional gags) who wants a sperm donation from Mitchell in order to impregnate his daughter. Mitchell refuses, so is kept prisoner while a parade of British Sex Queens are lead on in the hope of kick starting his libido and shaking him down for that special 'donation'. Stripteases, jumping him while jogging, 'my pussy's stuck' double-entendres and a bathtub threesome all fail to stir the unflappable doctor. Mercifully, further feeble temptations of the flesh are spared Mitchell when Corbett and a bunch of Italian gangsters in pin-stripe suits lead by Melvyn Hayes turn up at Pertwee's mansion. A more woeful than wacky hose fight and some nonsense on board a fire engine brings the final curtain down on the Superdoc's adventure, and not a moment too soon.
The worse of Ford. Attempts to win audience's sympathy when the lead's private life becomes a public freak-show (as in 'Percy' and the Gallic 'Pussytalk/Le sexe qui parle') are predictably eschewed here in favour of an endless parade of juvenile self abuse and sperm jokes. To the degree that the film's theme tune, a disco revamp of 'Hold On, I'm Coming' turns out to be one of Ford's more sophisticated ideas. Even the sex in the film is by Ford's standards tame. Punters briefly get to see Anna Bergman and Nicola Austine in and out of maid's uniforms and an intoxicated Mary Millington being showered with wine but only Mitchell's night-time escape to naughty Soho seems to have held the director's flagging interest.
Some commentators have mischievously suggested the Children's Film Foundations' production Glitterball borrowed from Ford's The Sexplorer, and here it's almost as if Ford was replaying the CFF's compliment with a skateboard chase through a park and mugging 'star' turns pitched more at the level of a children's pantomime than an X certificate sex film. Everyone in the cast is clearly slumming it, with Hayes, Pertwee and Bergman happy to trade in on their Sitcom popularity in It Ain't Half Hot Mum, Dad's Army and Mind Your Language respectively. Unsurprisingly then that no one survives with their dignity intact, but it's a particularly sad sight to see Corbett- a serious luvvie at heart who came to despise his comedy image- not even able to be funny anymore. Released at the dead end of the British sex film era, What's Up Superdoc was not a success and began Derek Ford's long descent into obscurity.
Could this really be the work of the same Derek Ford who made Diversions/Sex Express three years earlier? Sadly yes, assembling his first real 'name' cast since This, That and the Other in 1969 seems to have convinced Ford to make one of his most mainstream films with out and out comedy material taking the forefront and Ford's sexploitation past downplayed. But while ex-producing partner Stanley Long was able to make the jump from the sex documentary format of 'Naughty' to the audience pleasing 'Adventures of' comedies, Ford seemed too humourless and too into that Wife Swappers era of sex resulting in unwanted pregnancy, death, and misery to successfully reinvent himself as a comedy man. In fairness Ford's mid-Seventies sex comedies Commuter Husbands and The Sexplorer have their moments, but his attempts at creating a Xerox of the 'Confessions' series, in What's Up Nurse and this its sole sequel have the feel of unfunny and vulgar outbursts .
Taking place on bland sets that give the film the look of a poorly-moneyed sitcom What's Up Superdoc casts recently deceased TV actor Christopher Mitchell as a doctor who unknown even to himself is the 'Superdoc' the most fertile man in the world and who through sperm donation in his college years has fathered 837 children. A female doctor eventually tracks Mitchell down to break the news, and it's not long before he's 'unmasked' in the headlines as well. This elevates the portly, unattractive doctor to the unlikely level of a rock and roll sex god, women try to grab him in lifts, 'groupies' follow him around with test tubes hoping to get pregnant from a sperm donation, under the shadow of publicity his life becomes a misery.
To save him from being mobbed in the streets, Mitchell is put in the 24 hour protection of order-bellowing ex-sergeant major Goodwin (Harry H. Corbett) a nightmare character from the national service days. Corbett essentially holds Mitchell prisoner, forcing him to have as many 'cold baths' as possible and ejecting women with dodgy Swedish accents and exceptionally large breasts out of his apartment, much to Mitchell's resentment. Mitchell agrees to be a guest on Hughie Green's talk show, but his appearance proves disastrous when the 'family' entertainer's nasty side comes to the fore and Green has a foul mouthed outburst on air ('a joke' in the film, not entirely unbelievable in light of later revelations). Amidst the chaos Mitchell is kidnapped by ubiquitous movie heavy Milton Reid and Chic Murray from The Ups and Downs of a Handyman. They're cronies of a rich oil tycoon (Bill Pertwee whose 'Texan' accent is hopefully one of the film's intentional gags) who wants a sperm donation from Mitchell in order to impregnate his daughter. Mitchell refuses, so is kept prisoner while a parade of British Sex Queens are lead on in the hope of kick starting his libido and shaking him down for that special 'donation'. Stripteases, jumping him while jogging, 'my pussy's stuck' double-entendres and a bathtub threesome all fail to stir the unflappable doctor. Mercifully, further feeble temptations of the flesh are spared Mitchell when Corbett and a bunch of Italian gangsters in pin-stripe suits lead by Melvyn Hayes turn up at Pertwee's mansion. A more woeful than wacky hose fight and some nonsense on board a fire engine brings the final curtain down on the Superdoc's adventure, and not a moment too soon.
The worse of Ford. Attempts to win audience's sympathy when the lead's private life becomes a public freak-show (as in 'Percy' and the Gallic 'Pussytalk/Le sexe qui parle') are predictably eschewed here in favour of an endless parade of juvenile self abuse and sperm jokes. To the degree that the film's theme tune, a disco revamp of 'Hold On, I'm Coming' turns out to be one of Ford's more sophisticated ideas. Even the sex in the film is by Ford's standards tame. Punters briefly get to see Anna Bergman and Nicola Austine in and out of maid's uniforms and an intoxicated Mary Millington being showered with wine but only Mitchell's night-time escape to naughty Soho seems to have held the director's flagging interest.
Some commentators have mischievously suggested the Children's Film Foundations' production Glitterball borrowed from Ford's The Sexplorer, and here it's almost as if Ford was replaying the CFF's compliment with a skateboard chase through a park and mugging 'star' turns pitched more at the level of a children's pantomime than an X certificate sex film. Everyone in the cast is clearly slumming it, with Hayes, Pertwee and Bergman happy to trade in on their Sitcom popularity in It Ain't Half Hot Mum, Dad's Army and Mind Your Language respectively. Unsurprisingly then that no one survives with their dignity intact, but it's a particularly sad sight to see Corbett- a serious luvvie at heart who came to despise his comedy image- not even able to be funny anymore. Released at the dead end of the British sex film era, What's Up Superdoc was not a success and began Derek Ford's long descent into obscurity.