Ingrid: I’ll be the belle of the ball, and I’ll ball everyone!

Franco‘s “Barbed Wire Dolls” is a sexploitation classic with a long list of flaws that only seem to add to the film’s overall appeal. A slight mix of porn with a women in prison formula, “Barbed Wire Dolls” is that classic concept of a crooked prison, and a mole going undercover to expose their methods. Franco’s own vision of the penitentiary involves it being run by a slew of cartoonish villains, including an all female staff of armed guards, and a warden who dons a monocle, green short shorts and has a lesbian fetish. Young meek Maria (beautiful Lina Romay from the final “Ilsa” sequel) enters the prison/fortress (think Alcatraz meets “Emanuelle”) after a vicious crime and receives the brunt of their torture, while the prison system keeps their tactics closely guarded and secretive. After Maria arrives, a letter is intercepted meant to expose the superiors to authorities about the torture, and now suspicion looms as prisoners are taking the blame and being murdered while the potential rat is hiding within the walls. Director Jess Franco‘s film is pretty much just soft core pornography with a plot, as much of the sex scenes are zoomed in on and focused with great importance. The primary antagonist who hands out punishments to the women takes advantage of his prisoners by sleeping with them, and even the warden takes a moment to interrogate a virginal prisoner by attempting to pop her cherry.

Even Franco’s gentle sex scenes are reliant on much of our male superiors drugging women and raping them while they’re vulnerable. “Barbed Wire Dolls” is a film you’ll either take with a tongue in cheek attitude, knowing full well what Franco always have up his sleeve, or may probably offend you. Franco’s films are always steeped in misogyny and destruction of women and this prison film is no real difference. The movie doesn’t always rely on violence though as it tries to build a plot from the different characters including the Wardress who killed Maria’s father and blamed it on her, and the romance between Berta and Maria who decide to hatch an escape when the wardress becomes too power hungry. One of the many problems with Franco’s particular prison is that it’s often too similar to “The Wicked Warden,” and Franco almost borrows the entire storyline from “Barbed Wire Dolls,” with Ilsa acting as a more attractive wardress. “Barbed Wire Dolls” is the epitome of tedious, with a storyline that drones on, providing zero tension or suspense. But, for what it promises, it’s fairly serviceable Franco if disappointing.

It's not the best I've seen from Franco, since most of the climax feels rushed and wholly unresolved, but for a women in prison movie, you could do a lot worse. It's typical Franco misogyny, and it may get your goat.