Escape From Women’s Prison — Escape From Women’s Prison( Blu Ray)
Escape from Women's Prison (aka Le evase - Storie di sesso e di violenze, Jailbirds, Women Against Women, a Tale of Sex and Violence) originally appeared in 1978 in it’s native Italy, going on in 1984 getting a recut, dubbed & shorter US release. The film was written & directed by Giovanni Brusador (as Conrad Brueghel) - it was the one & only film he directed, instead he made a career from his acting roles- chalking up thirty-three roles- going from Italian TV work, and seemingly smaller/ minor roles in a few genre films moving from lo-budget spy thrillers, prehistoric fantasy, crime dramas, horror thriller, before returning to Italian TV in the 1980s. With Escape from Women's Prison he directors a passable enough thriller, though it doesn’t have much distinctive or particularly tense about it- I guess you’d say it starts off campy & fairly trashy, before moving towards more sleazed & disturbed waters mid-way, before rolling into a fairly predictable finale.
The film begins with a group of four women escaping over the wall of a prison- their getaway driver is one of the groups brother, and he gets shot in the processes of the escape- which fairly soon sees him crashing into a bus full of young women & their small male training team who there way to tennis torment. Fairly soon the group make their way to the house of mid-aged, mustached, and bald judge- and what unfolds is initial fairly tame home invasion film- which later starts to add the sleaze in- as we get the female prisoners raping a male team trainer with his hand tied behind his back, female on female rape, with later forced male urination, grimy if fairly tame male-to-female rape- which is all mostly sound-tracked by bright & sleazed blends of funk/sassy light jazz, and later bland euro pop, which doesn’t really build much tension or unpleasantness.
On the whole Escape From Women’s Prison is engaging enough- the judge character is fairly interesting & well enough acted, as he moves from been highly moral to decidedly sleazed. The four female actresses do look convincingly enough desperate, and don’t fall into the normal blond bimbo type characters in a lot of WIP type films. When the sleaze rises to the surface the main women attacking/ raping men & other women is a reverse from the normal sleaze/ exploitation tropes. On the downside the film never becomes too memorable campy, or too shocking or intense- so once you’ve watched it, there’s not a lot that will stay with you, or make you want to rewatch it often.
I watched the original Italian cut of the film- this features English sub-titles, having a runtime around one hour & thirty-four minutes. The main version here is the US version, which runs for just over an hour & twenty minutes- I’m guessing that this version has been cut off either the sleaze or story elements- though I had a quick scan through the print on fast forward, and it seemed to be roughly the same film.
This new release features a 4K scan, which looks good enough for a late 70’s film- though nothing spectacular, very much still having it’s grimy 1970’s edge. On the extras side we get thirty-three on-camera interview with the films director- intercutting in scenes from the film, press cuttings, time relevant info, etc- this gives you a nice insight into how & why the film first came about, going on to cover casting choices, the film's themes, etc- so all in a most worthy extra. We also get a trailer, and of course the Italian cut of the film, which is oddly put in the extras menu.
It’s always great to see lesser known Italian exploitation pictures, and it’s the same with Escape From Women’s Prison- sure I was expecting more of a female lead take on Ruggero Deodato’s roughie home invasion film House On The Edge Of The Park, and didn't get it. But if you come into this expecting a sleazy enough thriller- that’s more camp & enjoyable than shocking I think you won’t feel too let down.