Rating: D
Dir: Robert Collector
Star: Linda Blair, Sylvia Kristel, William Ostrander, Sue Kiel
I had vague memories of seeing this, and couldn’t work out why I had never reviewed it. After all, Linda Blair’s other eighties women-in-prison movie, Chained Heat, is one of the lynch-pins of the genre. Turns out there was good reason why I’d omitted this: it being more than a bit crap, for one. Considering Blair basically disavowed Chained, it’s a surprise to see her going back to drink from the WiP well, only a couple of years later, especially in a film putting her opposite renowned piece of Euro-totty Kristel. However, this is nowhere near as exploitative or sleazy. And – I’m sure this is just coincidence – nowhere near as entertaining either.
It takes place in Berlin, where all-American college girl, Christine Carlson (Blair), has gone to marry her fiancé, army boy Mike Grainger (Ostrander). After an argument, she storms off and witnesses the abduction of defector Hedda Kleemann (Kiel), by the East German Stasi. Christine gets swept up too, browbeaten into admitting she’s a CIA agent, and sentenced to three years in a Communist jail, alongside Hedda. Where, conveniently, everyone speaks English. So that’s nice. It’s nominally run by Warden Einbeck, but the real power rests in the hands of prison top dog and lifer, Sofia (Kristel). Christine will have to try and survive long enough, for Mike to figure out where she vanished to, and put together a rescue mission which will bring her back across the border to safety.
The problem is that too many people involved with this, appear to be under the illusion that they are making a serious movie. It is in direct contradiction to lines for Christine like, “You can’t do this to me! I’m an American!” Allegedly, it was sold to Blair as being along the lines of Midnight Express. Albeit, I suspect, if Midnight Express had starred Linda Lovelace and Marilyn Burns. To be fair, I do think some elements point to a legit movie. A Tangerine Dream soundtrack is not something often found in WiP films, for instance. But there’s probably good reason their score has never received an official release, unlike much of TD’s film work. Suspect the composers might have been a little ashamed of it?
From my perspective, it’s simply not very interesting. Blair might be able to pull off the squeaky clean co-ed, but her transition into a supposedly hardened individual is not at all convincing [she can pull tough off semi-credibly, as Savage Streets shows]. Kristel is no better in her role as queen of the jail, and the occasional attempts at sensuality are a series of misfires, and a waste of Sylvia’s talents in this area. The eventual brawl between her and Christine is barely visible, though it’s probably still better than Mike’s raid and subsequent escape, both spectacularly devoid of tension. Linda supposedly broke her leg during shooting. Viewers may end up contemplating similarly drastic measures to get out of sitting through this.