For this weekend's entertainment, I watched the Shout Factory's Roger Corman's Cult Classics Double Feature DVD of 1976's Jackson County Jail and 1974's Caged Heat.
This DVD has a cool feature called "The Grindhouse Experience" that allows you to watch both films back to back with period bumpers and trailers of other exploitation films.
JACKSON COUNTY JAIL
Advertising executive Dinah Hunter(Yvette Mimieux) leaves a promising career in Los Angeles to start a new life in New York City. She heads east on a long cross-country drive that becomes a nightmare after she picks up some hitchhikers and finds herself beaten up and stranded in a small town, then is thrown in the jailhouse on vagrancy charges. Dinah finds herself at the mercy of some bad cops, but she finds a way to escape with another prisoner, Coley Blake (Tommy Lee Jones). Now the two embark on a wild car chase with the police . . . Also starring Robert Carradine, Howard Hesseman and Mary Woronov.
Everything that can go wrong does go wrong for poor Dinah. She is the victim of male chauvinism at her job, then comes home and finds that her boyfriend, played by WKRP's Howard Hesseman is running around on her. She quits her job and calls up and old friend in New York who's happy to hire her. She never makes it. Dinah makes the mistake of driving across the country in her yellow AMC Pacer (remember those!). Dinah should have dumped the crappy car in L.A. and taken the airplane but she wants to see the country. She sees a lot more of it than she intends to.
Feeling sorry for a young couple she picks up a couple of hitchhikers who steal her car and her purse. Unfortunately for Dinah, she's now lost in Deliverance country. The owner of the roadside bar she goes into expects to get more than a handshake to let Dinah use the phone. When Dinah isn't willing, his buddy the Deputy Sheriff locks Dinah up because she doesn't have I.D.
I don't know what kind of jail this is, but they've got men and women in cells side by side with open bars. Dinah is in a cell next to a young Tommy Lee Jones who puts in a stellar performance. The night jailer decides that he might as well take advantage of a locked up woman and proceeds to help himself. Yvette Mimieux does a great job of acting the part of a rape victim. After being raped, Dinah picks up a stool and beats the jailer to death. (What kind of jail is this, where they have a wooden stool that can be easily turned into a deadly weapon sitting around in jail cells?)
Tommy Lee Jones gets the keys and lets them out and the chase is on. All of this leads to the climactic final shoot out with the cops where Tommy Lee is killed and Dinah is returned to jail to, presumably, face murder charges. (There was a made for TV sequel to this called Outside Chance that picked up where this movie left off and was the Women In Prison movie after Dinah's conviction.).
The DVD features an audio commentary by Director Michael Miller, Producer Jeff Begun and Director of Photography Bruce Logan.
CAGED HEAT
Thrown into the penal hell of Connorville, petty criminal Jacqueline (Erica Gavin) must fight against the ruthless inmates, a cruel warden (Barbara Steele) and her depraved staff. Eventually she forms an uneasy friendship with two hardened inmates. When these three unite, they find themselves on a sexy and violent adventure seeking escape, money and revenge. Also starring Roberta Collins and Rainbeaux Smith. Written and directed by Jonathan Demme (Silence of the Lambs).
Connerville Prison for Women is apparently run by the same people who run all those women's prison's in the Phillipines that Pam Grier served so much time in. There's the sadistic crippled and sexually frustrated warden and her very butch second in command and girlfriend. There's the prison doctor who likes to give electric shock therapy to the girls and to give the good looking one's a lobotomy so they will just lie there while he takes what he wants.
The inmates at Connorville are very clean. They take lots and lots of showers. In order to save money, the inmates don't wear uniforms they are allowed to wear their street clothes (halter tops, hot pants and mini-skirts!). And the female guards wear skirts above the knee and high heels. This must be scientific penology!
Three of the girls manage to get away and score big when they rob a group of bank robbers! But they're not finished - they want revenge on Connorville! They break back into prison and shoot it out with the guards. It's so exciting the crowds at the drive in probably took a break from making out to actually watch the movie!
The DVD features an audio commentary with Writer/Director Jonathan Demme who later directed Silence of the Lambs, Director of Photography Tak Fujimoto and Actress Erica Gavin.
There is also a Leonard Maltin interview with Roger Corman about both films. This was a great DVD for a lazy weekend. Five Stars.
