Froggy is alive and well, still digesting Thanksgiving flies and gnats and whatnot. This month I'm pulling out all the stops for my underrated gem of the month. This time I ain't fuckin' around. You all up for a little Nazi S&M or some Third Reich perversion and torture?!? The film I am most pleased to share with you all is Don Edmonds' 1975 release of Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS. This is exploitation sleaze of the highest caliber; a film tethered to absolutely no moral code or sense of humility, a film that doesn't even feign attempting redemption. It's unabashed Euro trash, never once confused with itself as something else. It revels in filth, and does so without compunction or any semblance of political correctness. In other words, hands down the best type of exploitation horror!
You see, Ilsa (Dyanne Thorne) is a German warden in a medical hospital during WWII. She's a cold, sexy, power starved dominatrix who indulges in all kinds of lascivious activity, even including bisexual orgies. As the buxom blond roams the barracks seeking fresh men to pick her teeth with, Ilsa punishes any and all who can't make the grade in the sack. She subjects them to all kinds of macabre medical torture; strapping people down, sawing off limbs, castrating them, tormenting them in the most brutal ways imaginable. Ilsa is out to prove women can endure more pain than men and therefore should be allowed to defend the front lines in battle. Naturally to prove this theory, Ilsa goes fuckin' ballistic on most of the men she uses in bed, never finding a single one who can sate her nymphomania.
Decked in full on Nazi attire, Ilsa turns to her "Black Widows", topless cohorts who aide the warden in rounding up potential suitors and victims. Everyone is naked in this flick it seems, no one with a care in the world or second thought about it. What's funny is the way Edmonds counterbalances the intimate torture scenes with full-fledged wartime action sequences like it was First Blood for crying out loud. Explosions, gun shots, tankers; all of it mere distraction from the grueling methods of madness Ilsa is so proud to administer. I can't state it enough - I LOVE this film!
3 best parts:
1. The performance and casting of Dyanne Thorne in the title role - both sexy and scary at once, quite a feat. (Thorne would go on to star in Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks, Ilsa, The Tigress of Siberia, and Jess Franco's Ilsa, The Wicked Warden).
2. When Ilsa nonchalantly plucks some dude's fingers into a bloody mass with some pliers. Topless no less.
3. When Ilsa castrates some chump who couldn't satisfy her in the bedroom, his blood is seen cascading through some sink filter. Pretty gnarly.
Feel free to peep the trailer, but beware, it's rife with nudity and violence.
That's it for me this month, be sure as always to check in next time for another Underrated Frog Baby Gem!
