Ilsa Double Feature – Ilsa, the Wicked W — Ilsa Double Feature(DVD)

In 1975 director Don Edmonds created a true exploitation classic when he filmed Ilsa – She Wolf of the SS for legendary producer of sleazy grindhouse pictures, David. F. Friedman. In 1963 along with his friend and collaborator Herschell Gordon Lewis he had unleashed Blood Feast, it was to be the world’s first gore film and started a career path that saw Friedman looking for ever more shocking and visceral images to put on screen. It seemed to him that sleaze sells, and he was going to take advantage of that. Whilst he produced Ilsa – She Wolf of the SS under a pseudonym it was business as usual for Friedman with lashings of gore, sex, torture and nudity all set within the rather tasteless setting of a Nazi medical camp. It was a raging success and its star Dyanne Thorne would take up the role another three times before she was done.

This DVD from Cheezy Flicks features two of those sequels, the second instalment, Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks directed once again by Edmonds, and the third instalment Ilsa The Wicked Warden, an unofficial sequel often known by the vastly superior alternative title of Greta the Mad Butcher and directed by Spanish horror maestro Jesus Franco. Franco’s film is first on the disc so that is where we’ll start our review.

Ilsa, The Wicked Warden (aka Wanda the Wicked Warden and Greta The Mad Butcher), the unofficial entry in the Ilsa saga from director Jess Franco and famed Swiss producer Erwin. C. Dietrich, sees Dyanne Thorne return, this time as the depraved warden of a women’s mental health clinic for sexually deviant women (Las Palomas). Franco himself stars as Dr Milton Arcos, the Doctor who is suspicious of Ilsa’s motives for running the facility. Arcos makes the acquaintance of a young woman, Abby (Tania Busselier), whose sister has disappeared at Las Palomas. Together they hatch a plan to get Abby committed to the clinic in order to gather evidence to put a stop to Ilsa’s immoral behaviour.
Once she has infiltrated the hospital Abby gets to know the other inmates, most notably a tough prisoner by the name of Juana, played by regular Franco muse, Lina Romay who starred in over 100 films for him, as well as becoming his wife. Juana is Ilsa’s lover, who enjoys playing at being her kinky pin cushion, and also operates as a link between the prisoners and the warden. Abby gathers her information against Ilsa and her assistant who are torturing the women and forcing them to have sex with male prisoners which they film in order to sell on as porno films. Abby must try to find out what happened to her sister and escape the hospital before Ilsa breaks her spirit and/or tortures her to death.

Ilsa the Wicked Warden is a masterpiece of sleaze, Dyanne Thorne revels in the role of Ilsa, the sexually depraved warden, while Busselier and Romay stand out as Abby and Juana. Possibly the most depraved in the series, Ilsa the Wicked Warden ramps up the sleaze to 11 with scenes of torture and rape, and a darker less campy feel than the other film on this disc. Those who know Franco’s work well may spot similarities to his movie Barbed Wire Dolls, the two were shot back-to-back using the same sets. The ever-thrifty Franco was a master of getting the most out of very little and never missed an opportunity to shoot for free.

Our other film is the second in the series, Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks, directed by Don Edmonds, who directed the original film and would later go on to produce Tony Scott’s True Romance. This time around our favourite anti-hero has found herself employed by a lascivious sheik, El Sharif, played by Joe Delony (Slacker). Ilsa is employed by the sheik to train the women he has imported from across the globe to be his sex slaves, her job is to ensure they behave just as he desires them to. Two American visitors arrive at El Sharif’s home on business, Commander Adam Scott, played by max Thayer (S.W.A.T. and The Retrievers) and his associate Kaiser have arrived with the express aim of striking a deal with El Sharif for some of the rich oil deposits beneath his stretch of the desert. Ilsa becomes smitten with Commander Scott and the pair begin a relationship, so when the sheik asks Ilsa to have Adam killed she must decide where her loyalties lie.

Overblown, sleazy and as camp as Christmas, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks whilst not quite as sleazy as She Wolf or Wicked Warden remains one of the better entries in the series, featuring lashings of sex, violence and some fairly ingenious forms of torture. The performances are solid, especially Thorne who sizzles as the cruel, debauched Ilsa, her larger-than-life portrayal works a treat and in every scene she features, she takes centre stage.

This release comes as a bare-bones disc with just the two films and no extra material. The prints are poor VHS quality, however this somehow adds to the films and their grindhouse credentials, it just feels more appropriate to be watching grainy damaged prints of these titles. This is perhaps in reference to my first seeing them as nth generation tapes back in the 1980s. Overall, the films are probably better than they deserve to be, and both feature outstanding performances from Thorne, who is always credible in her role and who you can tell is enjoying her portrayal of such a formidable, malevolent and dissolute character.