During the early 70s, thanks to the success of films like Jack Hill's “The Big Doll House “and “The Big Bird Cage”, the exploitation “women in prison” genre became very popular. Hong Kong's Shaw Brothers soon jumped on the bandwagon and gave the world their own version with added ingredients in the form of some swordplay and a trio of overseas actresses.
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Set in China in the 1940s during the Second Sino-Japanese War, while transporting gold stolen from the Chinese banks, a convoy of Japanese soldiers is ambushed by resistance fighters and the successfully retrieved loot is then hidden in a cave at White Cloud Peak by the only surviving fighter. After reaching home and while in the process of sending a telegram to his comrades, more Japanese soldiers arrive and kill him. However, he manages to pass on the secret of the treasure to his wife Hung Yu Lan (Lee Hye Sook) who is later put into a female concentration camp.
Elsewhere in a hospital, more Chinese locals are being bayoneted by Japanese soldiers who are looking for an American pilot, more slaughters follow before they locate and execute him. With their mission accomplished, they happily depart with a bunch of girls including some voluptuous Caucasian nurses to stock up in their 13th women concentration camp. The rest of the movie deals with their life there, including a couple of prison breaks and eventually to the fight for gold between the Japanese and the opposition fighters.
The movie kicks off with an eye-catching, opening-credits sequence consisting of a sleazy variety of women's bottoms and breasts in glorious freeze-frames while heavy psychedelic music pounding away in the background. It sure is hell for the women in this prison camp and as expected, the Japanese are pure evil and they torture them by day while high ranking commanders have their fun with them at night. Interestingly, cleanliness is also a top propriety at the camp, prompting the prisoners to take showers mostly in slow motion and of course exposing their full assets. This daily ritual regularly puts a big smile on the face of the camp's lesbian security chief Mako (Terry Liu Wai Yue) who later picks one of the women and has fun with her. However, there are plenty of cloth-tearing catfights too besides the normal daily whipping, slaving and forced sex.
In the meantime, Hung, together with a blind inmate, befriends the aggressive Nurse Jennifer (Birte Tave), nymphet Elizabeth (Niki Wane), Mary (Roska Rozen) and newcomer Wang Xia and the six of them bond into a group where they look out for each other. There are spies from both sides lurking in the camp too; one of them is Zheng, the prison cook and he is planning to get Hung out so she can take them to the loot. After their failed first breakout, Zhang reveals that there is another spy who can help Hung to escape and he is the second-in-command Cui Guo Dong (Lo Lieh). But they have to be on the alert because of a traitor among them.
Surprisingly, Birte Tave turns out to be a sufficient lead as the fiery inmate and fits in well with the rest of the cast, right down to her action scenes. The prolific Lo Lieh always delivers in whatever his roles call for and he looks super cool here in uniform and spotting dark shades even at night. As the commander, Wang Hsieh puts on a fairly good appearance but Terry Liu is the one who steals the show. Her Mako is a scheming lesbian character with a whip who radiates sleaziness and craves the unsuspecting inmates with sadistic hungry eyes while licking her lips.
While not his best effort, Kuei pretty much just sticks to the formula of the genre, especially in the first half set in the prison camp and all the elements are there. However, he seems to favor using star-filters to create a moody atmosphere. His approach to the love scene between Jennifer and Cui which is mostly shot in slow motion and in soft focus has a soft-core porn quality to it. To top it off, there are hundreds of lighted candles surrounding the lovers but really, do they have the time to light those candles? Still, the final fight between the Japanese and the Chinese, though action packed, is nothing to brag about.
Through Kuei, this Shaw Brothers' take on the “women in prison” genre has enough sleazyness and nudity to satisfy its targeted audience. Furthermore, it has some decent action like a car jumping over a wall in slow-motion, plenty of shootouts, Lo Lieh sword fighting with Wang Hsieh and lastly, Birte as a sharp shooter.
