My friend Shu runs a horror/explotation site with reviews on books & movies. Here is a short bit of his thoughts on Chained Heat with Linda Blair. I remember watching this movie on late night TV reruns as a teenager, and getting turned on by the shower scene. That was my first inkling that i might like girls, too!
I started out watching Chained Heat, a classic (in my mind) on the sub-genre that is Women in Prison flicks, which is part of the exploitation umbrella that encompasses so many other awesome sub-genres such as Naziploitation, Nunsploitation, Blaxsploitation, etc… Directed by Paul Nicholas, Chained Heat is not only one of my favorite of the Women in Prison movies, but it feels as if it is a grade above the rest in terms of sleaze, violence, action, story, and performances by some well-known names and some not-so-well-known names.
I first saw Chained Heat when I was in either Junior High or a Freshman in High School-my memory is a little hazy as to how old I was exactly, but the circumstances as to how I acquired the craptastic Video Treasures Extended Play edition on VHS were pretty clear. I stole the bad boy from a Kohl’s Department Store in the Northwest Suburbs of Chicago. There. I did it. I just admitted to a crime I committed as a young, rebellious minor while living in the suburbs of Chicago. It sounds even more suburban because Kohl’s was located in a shopping mall that is not even the same structure and layout presently.
I stole the VHS copy and watched it solely on the prospect of getting a chance to see some very sexy women, such as Sybil Danning, Monique Gabriel, Sharon Hughes, Edy Williams, and Marcia Karr. Honestly, seeing Linda Blair whom I remember so fondly as a young, little girl that gets possessed by a demon and needs an exorcism in The Exorcist naked was not going to be a high-point for me in this movie. I wanted to see it because I was hoping there would be tons of nudity (including full-frontal bush), lesbian shower and prison scenes, violent rape and torture, incredibly over-the-top tough-girl dialogue and multiple prison yard fights with sadistic guards and a warden that was tough as nails and hated everyone and everything. I think that there just summed up about everything that Chained Heat had to offer.
Read the whole review here http://www.shuizmz.com/review-women-in-prison-triple-feature/
What is your all time favorite exploitaion/sexy horror flick? I loved The Abductors also…
I used to go see ALL the grindhouse movies in the area known as “The Deuce” around New York’s Times Square, and also in a couple of scary cinemas in the Bronx. Those theaters were crazy! You could see anything happen there and, whatever you were looking for, you could find it there. When I saw Re-Animator in the Bronx, someone was stabbed in the audience during the climax. The guy was screaming, but the audience refused to leave — we didn’t want to miss the ending — so we got up and moved to the other side of the cinema to stay out of the way. Some counselors from a camp for kids with special needs had brought their class there(!), and I remember one kid who was wearing a kind-of muzzle.
My favorites at the time were 1) Chained Heat, 2) Re-Animator, 3) Cannibal Holocaust, 4) The Evil Dead, 5) Maniac. I also loved all the Italian “giallos” and “Oz-ploitation” flicks from down under. The latter is the subject of a terrific documentary called “Not Quite Hollywood” that I highly recommend.
If you like the women’s prison genre, don’t forget Caged Heat (directed by Jonathan Demme and featuring Cheryl Rainbeaux Smith, at whose funeral I was a pallbearer) and Caged Fury (starring my friend Roxanna Michaels) — all the best movies in the genre have “Caged” or “Chained” in the title!
There’s also Reform School Girls, directed by Tom DeSimone — the man who made Chatterbox (starring my late friend Candice Rialson), a movie about a young woman with a talking/singing vagina.
How do you know all of these broads, Mike? I’m not trying to insult you, but I’ve never heard of you before I started posting here, and it seems as if you’ve gotten around pretty well.
@Fartz — I met Roxanna through our mutual friend, Taimie Hannum — I shot three movies with Taimie. Both of those ladies are a lot of fun, and very dear to me.
Candice Rialson was a favorite of mine, and I wrote an article on her for a national magazine in the early 1990s. She was a fave of Quentin Tarantino’s as well — he based the Bridget Fonda character in Jackie Brown on her. Most people in the industry thought she had died, but lo and behold I found her alive and well, living in the Antelope Valley north of LA. Sadly, she passed away from liver disease a few years ago. She was a very special woman, and I miss our conversations very much.
Cheryl Smith was someone I only met once, but when I heard about her passing I attended her funeral at Forest Lawn. There were only a few people there, and I volunteered to help lay her to rest. She’d had a very troubled life, yet her memorial was very inspirational and moving.
That’s a pretty goddamn stand-up thing to do.
My question was more about what you’ve done in the industry and how you get around so much. I know you either wrote or directed that Busty Cops movie that Joeknow used to unsuccessfully give you shit about, but other than that, you seem to be a paid internet commentator. Aren’t you a lawyer or something?
Speaking of lawyers, wasn’t yesterday supposed to be the big fun lunch date with Tara?
@fartz – Today’s the court date. We’ll be heading over there in about an hour.
Actually, I’m an UNPAID internet commenter. LOL How’d I end up in this job? LMFAO
I haven’t been in the law game in a long time. I just didn’t like it. I like to call myself a “recovering attorney.”
I’ve been around this business since 1993, and it’s been a hub of my social life since then. Even my softcore movies mainly feature adult industry performers (and non-performers, like my buddy Axel Braun, who plays Shyla Stylez’s husband in Call Girl Wives). While many people get into this business to meet the girls, I started directing because I was already dating, or on friendly terms with, these girls, and I knew who would show up, and who would work hard, and what their personalities were like. I did eleven pictures like that, as writer and/or director and/or producer. Three are on Pay-TV and VOD right now.
I love these people, and I care about them. I was there when AIM was founded. I’ve seen many of the watershed events of the last 18 years up close.
I used to write entertainment news for an international news syndication company (and photo agency). For over seven years, I also covered the adult industry for them. I interviewed everybody, and attended every event — even many of the industry-only “meetings” from “the old days.”
I still write — though not always as Whiteacre — about a lot of different issues, only some of them related to the adult industry. I’m doing two pieces for national publications right now. One of these will probably be published as Whiteacre.
Additionally, I was a cable TV distributor from 1997 to 2005, and among my clients on the adult side (which was only about 1/3 of our business) were many famed adult producers: Andrew Blake, New Sensations, Elegant Angel, etc…
So, in short, I know the business, and I know the people. I don’t make a cent off of the adult industry; I defend it, and these people, on principle. Few else have jumped top to do so. But just like Cheryl Smith’s funeral, somebody had step in.
Do you have a blog or anything? I’m interested to hear your take on different things.
I’ve been resistant to doing a blog. I’ve got a few articles coming out soon, some more documentary stuff, and then two new erotic movies. Plus, I like commenting here on Cindi’s site, as well on the Blog of Pro-Porn Activism and the LA Weekly.
For now, I’d prefer to stick to discussing the things that I find interesting and important (not to mention funny) in those media, either as commentary or through my creative work.
Michael Whiteacre…that night in the Bronx watching Re-animator sounds surreal. A stabbing? Special needs kids? I bet those kids were making some strange sounds. If anybody dropped acid before the movie they sure went for one hell of a trip.
I like Sybil Danning. Loved “Malibu Express” and “There playing with Fire”. These are more tits and ass movies than horror flicks. I think Sybil would have done porn if she didnt make it in B movies. I think if she didnt get that break she would be doing fuck films. I bet thats what happened to Angela Baron.
@goatlord – Oh, they were making sounds all right. One of the counselors jumped up and ran to the other side of the cinema when the trouble started, leaving only one to calm and gather up the kids. “Surreal” is an understatement.
I also love Sybil Danning, and I often see her around Hollywood. She’s in terrific shape, BTW. They’re Playing With Fire, like Private Lessons, was a favorite of every horny (heterosexual) boy in my day. I videotaped both off of HBO back in the day.
Angela Baron is a lengthy, but very interesting story — for another time.