Jul 27, 2020

The Hot Box (1972)



Written by Jonathan Demme and produced with Roger Corman, this is less a Women In Prison (WIP) movie, and more a jungle action flick.  Four nurses working at a medical center in the Republic of San Rosario are abducted by guerrilla rebels, then proceed to commit acts of terrorism and acts of skinny dipping.



 Lynn Forrest (Margaret Markov) is a nurse working at a poor remote jungle hospital.

 Sue Pennwright (Laurie Rose)

The comically stupid  Bunny Kincaid (Andrea Cagan), and finally...

 Ellie St. George (Rickey Richardson) is the fourth and last of the nurses.

 Their beach party is crashed by a group of gun toting guerrillas 

The girls are forced to trek across the jungle to their camp.


 Sue (Laurie Rose)

One of the men cuts open Lynn's bikini top.

Flavio (Carmen Argenziano), their leader, arrives and stops them before they rape Lynn.

They're taken to their secret base of operations to act as medics for the rebels.

God Bunny is so fucking stupid.  She tries to wink at one of the rebels... these guys have abducted her and her friends, killed one guy, and tried to rape Lynn.  And she's making funny faces at them?

 Lunn and Sue skinny dip along with the other two girls.

Bunny loses her shit for a moment; Lynn rushes to calm her down.

 Sue confronts Flavio.

Flavio explains that they are trying to overthrow a hostile and corrupt government.  It's a noble cause.

 Sue demonstrates CPR.

 Lynn assists Flavio in gun battles for supplies and your average terrorist tomfoolery. 

 We haven't had a skinny dip scene in the last few minutes.  Time for another.

 Lynn explains that she's starting to buy the guerrilla's mission and wants to help.

 Sue thinks she's full of shit, and wants to escape.

/Sue consults with Ronaldo (Zaldy Zshornack) on how to get the hell outta there.

 Bunny distracts a guy so they can steal his boat.

They're escape plans are foiled when they are captured by the evil Major Dubay (Charles Dierkop).

 Dubay gets Sue alone.

Actress Laurie Rose was in The Adult Version of Jekyll & Hide and The Suckers from this same year.  She was married to Bill Davis, the guy who directed over fifty episodes of Hee-Haw, and bunch of other stuff including Solid Gold, Barney Miller, The Carpenters Very First TV Special, The Jacksons TV series, and more. Laurie Rose appeared as a belly dancer in several shows including Good Times, Fame and Mama's Family.

 What follows is a rather shocking scene for a movie that's been fairly campy all along. Dubay rips off Sue's top.

 He then smacks her across the face, knocking her out.


Holy shit, I did not expect this.  Dubay proceeds to pull down Sue's shorts while she's still unconscious.


 The other three girls manage to escape, and they save Sue.

 Shit hits the fan. It's the guerrillas versus evil government.

 Battle number two takes place in the jungle, with the rebels winning this round.

The girls leave, but Lynn wants to stay and fight with Flavio. THE END


I expected your run-of-the-mill Women In Prison (WIP) flick set in the jungle.  Instead, I get a political action movie, complete with tons of explosions, two skinny dipping scenes, interesting characters, surprises around each turn and a disturbingly graphic rape that comes out of nowhere.  Not something I'd probably watch again, but still quite the ride while it lasted. 

Double Feature: More girls drawn into armed terrorist groups in Tanya (1976), loosely based on the Patricia Hearst story
★★★★★

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