Chained Heat (1983)

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Really Surprised!

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

The still cute as a button Linda Blair entered the pleasingly sleazy portion of her career with this well regarded 1980's classic in the Women-In-Prison genre. Linda plays Carol Henderson, a basically innocent young woman who'd accidentally killed a man with her car and is sent to prison for 18 months. Well, this particular prison is just brimming with corruption; the prisoners and staff alike are lowlifes. Although it's a guarantee it's been mentioned countless times already, an indicator of how depraved everybody is would be the fact that the genial creep of a warden (John Vernon) has a hot tub in his office, and likes to videotape his dalliances with the prisoners. Director / writer Paul Nicholas and writer Aaron Butler go down the list of W.I.P. requirements quite sufficiently. Our cast is full of damn sexy ladies, and there's a generous dose of full frontal nudity from some players and breast shots at the least from others. We get some steamy heterosexual and lesbian sex scenes, and some notably harsh violence (including rape) and gore. The cast reads like a virtual Who's Who of cult stars and other familiar faces - blonde goddess Sybil Danning and striking Tamara Dobson play rival gang leaders, Nita Talbot a hard nosed investigator, Stella Stevens the crooked captain of the guards, and a hilarious (not surprisingly) Henry Silva her partner in crime. Also appearing are Sharon Hughes (the inspiration for Prince's song "Little Red Corvette"), Kendal Kaldwell, Robert Miano, Dee Biederbeck, Greta Blackburn, Jennifer Ashley, Jody Medford, Monique Gabrielle, Edy Williams, Marcia Karr, Carole Ita White, Susan Meschner, Michael Callan, Jonna Lee, and Irwin Keyes. (Trivia notes: several of the actors here had already appeared in another W.I.P. favourite, "The Concrete Jungle", and Vernon's daughter Kate made her film debut with "Chained Heat" as one of the unnamed extra inmates! Nothing like keeping it in the family.) All of these people are a joy to watch, especially Linda, endearing as ever, Danning, Dobson, Stevens, Vernon, and Silva. Miano excels in his part as the lecherous guard Stone. It's particularly fun to see the ever delightful Louisa Moritz in a special appearance as TV addict Bubbles. Joseph Conlan's catchy music is a nice accompaniment to the various trashy goings-on, and prolific and reliable cinematographer Mac Ahlberg, whose name you'll see in the credits of a number of 80's genre efforts, gives the movie a slick look. An absolute must for any trash lover, "Chained Heat" is great entertainment all the way. Followed by "Chained Heat II" a decade later. Eight out of 10.

I was expecting something a lot more exciting then this. What a snoozer!! Very bad dialogue and terrible plot as this movie quickly goes in the wrong direction by dwelling too much on racial tensions between the inmates. This movie could have been better served with just the evil warden scenario.Another problem is that this flick needed more attractive inmates, not just two or three to make up for the ten other ugly ones. Iam not sure if they were trying to make a realistic movie about a corrupt female prison and then it went bad or what, but much of this movie never made sense. The poorly written lines and the boring fight scenes makes this a forgettable movie. I was really looking forward to a good WiP movie and instead I felt really let down.

`Chained Heat' is a wonderfully vulgar piece of trash that has everything anyone would want in a Women-In-Prison movie: lots of boobs, frontal nudity, lesbian action, drugs, prostitution, rapes, shootings, stabbings, strangulations, and much, much more.Linda Blair is the naive `heroine' who finds herself in a rather unique penal institution. Apparently, the authorities of the unnamed state in which this story takes place decided they required a lockup reserved almost exclusively for women with `D' cups. (Linda in the movie showed she didn't quite fit this criterion, but apparently some exceptions were made.) Naturally, the prison officials are corrupt to their core (you should see the warden's `playroom') and not above having the women inmates show `good behavior' (if you know what I mean, and I think you do.) There is some animosity between the various factions among the prisoners, but, as one might expect, the girl gangs find a commonality of purpose in the final blow-up toward the end of the movie.`Chained Heat' is a flick that will stick in your mind long after you've forgotten a lot of other movies.

This has to be one of my all time favourite sexploitation movies. A stellar cast, over-the-top acting, lots of prison fights and violence, and just enough nudity to give it added appeal. The drive-in theatres here in Toronto held over this classic in '83 and brought it back as an added feature in '84. The sound fluctuates, the boom microphone shows up in parts, and the movie is dark, however, these technical flaws do not take away from the grittiness of this movie, they just add to it. If you are looking for a good "women in chains" movie, this is one of the best.