Frauengefängnis (1975)

User Rating:

4.9/10   

Director:

Jesus Franco

Writers:

Jesus Franco (writer)
Connie Grau (script)

Release Date:

23 April 1976 (West Germany)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Horror | Thriller

Tagline:

Welcome to prison, Ladies!

Plot Keywords:

Island | Death | Women's Prison | Lesbian | Torture

Cast

Lina Romay	...	Maria da Guerra
Paul Muller	...	Carlos Costa (as Paul Müller)
Monica Swinn	...	The Wardress (as Monika Swinn)
Roger Darton	...	Milton Warren
Ronald Weiss	...	The Warden
Martine Stedil	...	Bertha Contrini
Eric Falk	...	Nestor
Peggy Markoff	...	Pompadour
Nathalie Mann
Denis Torre
Raymond Hardy	...	José (as Ray Hardy)
Beni Cardoso	...	Rosaria Cortina

Also Known As:

Barbed Wire Dolls (USA)
Caged Women (UK)
Woman Caged (Philippines: English title)
Women's Penitentiary IV

Runtime:

90 min | Australia:74 min (cut) | Germany:78 min | UK:76 min (cut)

Country:

Switzerland

Language:

French

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

UK:18 (cut) | Argentina:18 | Australia:R | UK:R | West Germany:18 | UK:18 | Germany:BPjM Restricted

Company:

Elite Film

Trivia:

Paul Muller, the Swiss actor who played Carlos Costa, was dubbed by Gerd Duwner.

Quotes:

[Maria finds a dead mouse under the food on her plate]
Maria da Guerra: Ah! A mouse!
Guard: What's wrong?
Maria da Guerra: I found a mouse here on my plate. Look at it!
Guard: So what? It adds protein to your diet.
[Guard pushes Maria's face onto the plate]

Movie Connections:

Edited into Les gardiennes du pénitencier (1979)

Rough, but memorable

Here it is... perhaps the most notorious of Jess Franco's 180-plus films. Franco had made a few women-in-prison films before "Barbed Wire Dolls", but this, almost undoubtedly, is the pinnacle of the bunch for many reasons (and not all good).

Maria da Guerra (Lina Romay) is sent off to a prison on a Mediterranean island for killing her incestuous father (Jess Franco, in a simultaneously funny and disturbing flashback). There, she meets The Wardress (Monica Swinn, in an effective performance as a lesbian sadist), who takes joy in harassing her, and the prison doctor (Paul Muller), who does her trivial favors in exchange for sex. The abuse of the inmates by the Wardress and others becomes so clearly rampant that Maria and her cellmate (the lovely Martine Stedil, a sort of Julia Stiles look-a-like) eventually come to the realization that only escape will ensure their survival.

It's hard to judge whether "Barbed Wire Dolls" is a good film. Like other movies of its kind, it's loaded with shameless nudity (including vaginal close-ups), prolonged torture scenes, and general ludicrousness. However, Franco seems to deliberately distance us from the sex here, presenting it only as pure abuse and/or as a means of power. There's very little that's titilating in this movie. The torture (accompanied by lots of verbal torment) isn't particularly graphic, but Franco holds those scenes for so long that they do, indeed, become disturbing. The atmosphere, on the whole, is very despairing, and the conclusion of the film equally so.

"Barbed Wire Dolls" is also a very drab looking film, and its 'technical ineptness' has often been pointed out. But the unrestrained camera-work (probably by Franco himself) actually works to its advantage, in a creepy documentary-style. In fact, it borders on the surreal - for instance, when he suddenly zooms from guards walking about outside the prison to a wide shot of the sea. Could this symbolize the desire for freedom? Or is this reading too much into Franco?

"Barbed Wire Dolls" isn't for the fainthearted, or even for fans of less harsh Franco. I'm not sure that I can recommend it, as you'll definitely need a shower after viewing (or probably well before it's over), and I'm not sure what good you'll take away from it. But it's certainly a memorable, ugly, unsettling little piece of cinema.