WOMEN IN CAGES
dir. Gerardo de León, 1971
United States/Philippines. 81 min.
In English.

FRIDAY, MARCH 1 – MIDNIGHT
TUESDAY, MARCH 12 – 7:30 PM
THURSDAY, MARCH 21 – 10 PM
SATURDAY, MARCH 30 – 10 PM

After being framed by her drug dealer boyfriend while vacationing in the Philippines, Carol “Jeff” Jeffries is locked behind bars in a harsh prison somewhere in the jungles of Manila. Jeff endures daily torture and degradation at the hands of the prison’s sadistic head matron, Alabama. After learning that a local drug kingpin is out to silence her once and for all, Jeff realizes that the only means of securing her freedom is escape.

Pam Grier, in just her third-ever film role, steals the show as the villainous Alabama, flipping the script on her earlier role as one of the tortured inmates in Jack Hill’s THE BIG DOLL HOUSE, released the same year. Apart from Grier’s standout performance, what sets this entry apart from most other 1970s WIP releases is the grittiness and brutality with which the prison conditions are portrayed. In contrast to Corman’s other productions, de Leon mostly eschews tantalizing scenes, moments of levity, and feminist or other political subtext in favor pure grindhouse exploitation. What’s left is a portrait of prison life so harrowing that one notable future Grier collaborator once referred to it as “soul-shattering, life-extinguishing”, describing its final shot as one of “devastating despair”.