Review: 99 Women

Innocent Maria Rohm and heroin-addicted Luciana Paluzzi are two of the newbies at a remote island women’s prison run by a brutal and sadistic lesbian warden (Mercedes McCambridge) and overseen by a sleazy governor (Herbert Lom). Maria Schell plays a well-meaning but useless prison shrink, who tries to get better treatment for the prisoners, but eventually Rohm and Paluzzi realise their only chance for survival is escape. Rosalba Neri plays the requisite 'warden’s pet' who has her eyes on one of the newbies in particular.

 

1969 Jesus Franco (“Vampyros Lesbos”, “Eugenie de Sade”, “Count Dracula”) film is one of the earlier versions of the kind of sleazy, exploitative women in prison (WIP for short) films that would become a bit of a schlock staple in the 70s and 80s. It’s probably one of the best as well, at least from the ones I’ve seen. It’s a solid effort from the erratic but prolific Franco who made several films in this subgenre.

 

If this is your kind of film, this is a film you definitely need to see. All others might want to steer clear depending on your sensibilities, though oddly enough for a Franco film and WIP film the focus is more on being entertaining rather than explicit. In fact, the one scene that Franco actually screws up is the one scene you’d least expect: the requisite sapphic scene. The geography of the scene is incoherent due to Franco’s penchant for extreme close-ups, occasional zooms, and worst of all a soft focus lens that topples over into just plain blurry. I get that it was 1969 and maybe the big names in the cast might not want to be associated with anything harder, but it’s hard to get your bearings in the scene. It’s also the one stylistic misstep in an otherwise very stylish, and enjoyably shot film from an artistic perspective. Speaking of artistic, this isn’t “Citizen Kane” but it’s a slightly more serious WIP film than you’d expect from Franco and certainly a bit more focussed on being a legit movie than what the subgenre would quickly descend into. In other words, this is Franco before he became the full-time sleaze merchant he’s most famous for being. That said, we’re still talking a WIP film and a Franco film, so it’s not “Bambi”, just a lot tamer than you might expect – and perhaps wish.

 

I’m kind of amazed Franco managed to get a cast like this especially for this type of film, though Herbert Lom would end up in several Franco films over the years. Playing the prisoner’s governor, the only worse fate for the inmates here would be if Franco himself were playing the role. He and Mercedes McCambridge as the heavily accented, butch matron really get into the sleazy, camp spirit. McCambridge in particular borders on Frau Blucher with that outrageous Teutonic accent. Similarly enjoyable and well-cast is Rosalba Neri who gets into a water-soaked catfight 15 minutes into the film. I’m not sure her behaviour is always consistent but she’s a lot of fun at any rate and hotter than hell. I like Maria Schell as an actress very much, but in this film she seems to have facial paralysis and gives by far the weakest performance in the film. She’s the one participant here who looks embarrassed and depressed to be in it. The film rather jarringly switches protagonists from Luciana Paluzzi to Maria Rohm in the second half despite the former’s top billing. I must say I found that first half a bit more interesting, it’s not as much fun outside the prison walls.

 

This one has all the tropes you expect, but was one of the first of this sleazy branch of the prison flick. It’s enjoyable stuff if this is your bag, though if anything Franco might’ve tried to be a bit too tasteful with this one. Still fun for what it is and it’s able to be taken a bit more seriously than most of the subgenre. The IMDb rating of 4.6 is really unfair in my opinion, I’m quite shocked by that. The screenplay comes from multiple people including Franco, producer Harry Alan Towers (who produced and wrote multiple Franco films like “The Bloody Judge” and “Count Dracula”), Milo G. Cuccia (Franco’s “Venus in Furs”), Carlo Fadda (ditto), and Javier Peres Grober (no further credits).

 

Rating: B-

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