Women in Cages

American B-film companies found in the Philippines a cheap, plentiful supply of labour and locations for their tropical drive-in sleazefests. Admittedly these exploitation films are an acquired taste and a dubious form of entertainment; however they mark an important cultural milestone as the first features where a black actress, even playing a prison moll or topless revolutionary, is given a lead role of any substance. Director Jack Hill started the eightball rolling when he shot The Big Doll House in 1971, set in a nameless Latin American prison but filmed in the Filipino jungle. Unseen in Australia since the early 70s, the film featured a mixed cast of local and American exploitation regulars, but it's remembered as the first high-profile role for the later Queen of Blaxploitation, Pam Grier.

Legend has it that Sam Arkoff, head of American International Pictures saw a statuesque Grier at his company switchboard and cast her on the spot for her breakthrough hit Coffy. That, as they say, is bull shee-it. The former beauty queen made her film debut in 1970 as an extra in Russ Meyer's big breast bonanza Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls, and appeared in a number of B-pics shot in the Philippines the following year for AiP's rival company, Roger Corman's New World Pictures. Alongside her role as the tough-as-nails prostitute in Big Doll House were supports in the horror flick The Twilight People and as a topless hooker (again!) in Cool Breeze, then back behind bars for Women In Cages.

In Women In Cages, Grier plays the sadistic warden for once, a pot-smoking lesbian with a fully-equipped torture chamber (including a guillotine!). The 'New Fish' (a recent inmate, for you prison film novices), a ditzy blonde ex-stripper called Alabama, has taken the heroin possession rap for her pimp boyfriend. She knows too much, so the pimp blackmails her cellmates to execute her. A competent and well-shot entry in the tropical prison genre from Filipino director Gerry De Leon, it places the embittered ex-addict and prostitute Grier in the position of slave owner, watching her white charges toiling away in the plantation with obvious ironic glee.

Afraid of being caught with a stash of heroin by the Filipino law enforcement, a drug dealer named "Rudy" (Charlie Davao) slips the package inside a purse belonging to his girlfriend, "Carol Jeffers" (Jennifer Gan). When she is apprehended, she remains silent in the naive belief that Rudy will pull some strings and get her released. Instead, she is sentenced to 10 years of hard labor in a remote prison deep inside the Philippine jungle. Even then she remains convinced that Rudy will make every effort to get her out. Instead, he tries to ensure her silence by having one of her cell mates named "Stoke" (Roberta Collins) kill her. If that wasn't bad enough, the main patron named "Alabama" (Pam Grier) takes sadistic pleasure in torturing the inmates and Carol is in her sights. At any rate, rather than spoil the film for those who haven't seen it, I will just say that this is essentially a B-grade exploitation film. The acting is second rate, and the fight scenes leave much to be desired. Likewise, as in most films of this type, one should be aware that there is some nudity and a couple of graphic scenes here and there. Even so, the story flows smoothly and there are some attractive women, most notably Judith Brown (as "Sandy") along with the aforementioned Roberta Collins and Pam Grier to keep things interesting. And while it's certainly not a great film by any stretch of the imagination, it's not necessarily a bad film considering the genre.

With a title like "Women in Cages", a filming location in the Philippines and salacious posters featuring scantily clad women, it's obvious that this is NOT a Merchant-Ivory Production! It's clearly a low-budget schlock film and without even seeing it, I knew the film would include lots of violence, girl fights and boobs. That is just the sort of film they made in this country back in the 70s.

Although Pam Grier appeared in other Women in Prison films, in this case she does not play a prisoner but a sadistic lesbian matron who delights in abusing her charges. Now you might ask why a Black-American lady is in the Philippines doing this--you can only assume that she's REALLY dedicated to her job (plus I heard they had a great dental plan). In addition, she is able to vent her anger towards White ladies--as, oddly, this Asian prison has an over-abundance of Americans. Eventually, Grier's sadism is too much for some of the ladies and they take their chances escaping into the jungle--a jungle from which no one has ever successfully escaped! Can the sexy young ladies (all who appear about 25) escape? Or, for that matter, does anyone in the audience really care? Overall, this is a trashy exploitation film--the sort you'd have expected to see in sleazy 70s grind houses. Cheap, stupid but entertaining on a VERY base level--it's definitely not everyone's cup of tea! But, if you like unabashed trash, this is as good as any and it delivers exactly what you'd expect.

For those viewers who are accustomed to cheering on the antics of cult actress Pam Grier on screen, her character in 1972's "Women in Cages" may come as something of a surprise. Far from her bodacious, sympathetic action heroine, she here plays as nasty a personage as can be imagined: a pot-smoking, white race-hating, lesbian sadist from Harlem named Alabama, who is the matron in an exceptionally sleazy Filipino prison for women. Fans of this type of film--a subgenre that includes other New World films such as "The Big Doll House" ('71) and "The Big Bird Cage" ('72), both with Grier--know what to expect from such: nude shower scenes, sadistic but lovely prison guards, a handful of gorgeous inmates and over-the-top action sequences. While not as much fun as the other two films just named, "Women in Cages" does still provide the requisite goods, and Pam stakes her claim to be placed in the pantheon of such classic female jailers as Dyanne Thorne in the "Ilsa" films, Barbara Steele as the crippled warden in "Caged Heat" ('74), and my favorite, the grotesque matron that Hope Emerson plays in "Caged" ('50). In addition to Pam, the film boasts the presence of cult favorite Roberta Collins, as a smack-addicted rat fink; several catfights; vermin (of the snake, rat, leech and Filipino bounty hunter/rapist varieties); torture by fire, whip, rack, wheel and electricity; AND an oceangoing brothel. Though I still prefer the underrated Grier films "The Arena" ('73) and especially "Black Mama, White Mama" ('72) to this one, "Women in Cages" still proved an entertaining diversion.

Jeff is sent to a woman prison, after being caught carrying heroine that belonged to her crime figure boyfriend Rudy. He asks her to keep her mouth shut and would try his best to get her out, but unknowingly to her he has other plans. When she arrives at the prison to do her time, she must face a tyrant of a head warden, Alabama who has a thing against American woman and a sadistic torture chamber of the dark ages called "the playpen" for certain troublemakers.

We all know the formula by now for cheap drive-in WIP features, I take it? Wrongly accused woman. Hard labourers work in the fields. Out-of-control cat-fights. Mass showering. Suffering at the hands of the head warden. Harsh terrain surrounding the prison to make it hard to escape. A gusty prison break. And finally those corrupted individuals get their up and comings. So basically the heat is on in the banana republic.

"Woman In Cages" is another quick, cheaply done Corman production, but this time Jack Hill didn't hold the helm. Instead Gerry De Leon was in the director's chair and he brought to the table a real mean-spirited and quite gloomy Philippine WIP affair. His conventional direction might lack style and cracking energy, but it's balanced out by its intrusive grittiness. The story by James H. Watkins and David R. Osterhout is rather straightforward with little lead way in its same-old-same-old actions and plodding moments, but plenty of sour and quite outlandish moments do occur. The moral card of injustice that leaks its way in comes off as quite silly and lazy. While, there's some slight wit evident, it just seems to get derailed. It mainly concentrates on the unpleasantness and sleazy nature that's drilled in constantly. In the long run these scenes might be effectively crude, but personality does lose out to this rough shtick that really does dry up proceedings. The characters don't feel as dominating; say in "The Big Doll House". Some of the actresses of that film do turn up here. Pam Grier plays the nihilistic lesbian head prison guard with such venom, but this hard-boiled devil woman glow does take away from her energetic persona. The crackling stunner Roberta Collins is in fine form as the on edge drug addict and the gorgeously biting Judith M. Brown also appears. Jennifer Gan was decent in the lead role of the glassily clueless Jeff. Music director Tito Arevalo provides a smoking; on-the-ball soundtrack and Felipe Sacdalan's cinematography methods are unsparingly grounded.

Not one of the best of the sub-genre, but well worth a look for the fans for some glorified badass whipping in this mostly dour WIP outing.