"Schoolgirls in Chains", with its grotesquely provocative yet inaccurate title, may perhaps thrive on a series of ultimately controversial, shocking and politically incorrect themes, but the low-budget elaboration and lack of talent involved (fortunately?) prevented the film from becoming the nasty exploitation highlight it clearly hoped to be. If director Donald Jones would have been capable of gloriously depicting all the rancidness he suggests in the script (including rape, torture, necrophilia and incest), then "Schoolgirls in Chains" indeed would have been a genuine exploitation classic, but now it's just a mildly offensive & amusingly inept 70's trash-gem. The most demented aspect about this film (*** extra spoiler warning ***) is that the story's hero is a teacher who actually has sexual liaisons with under-aged female students. How incredible is that? Normally he'd be thrown in jail for that, but here he ends up saving the day! The story introduces two middle-aged brothers still living in their secluded parental mansion and filling their days with, well, nothing really
except kidnapping random young girls and subjecting them to torturous games. Johnny is mentally disabled and doesn't fully realize his victims don't voluntarily choose to play doctor with him. His older brother Frank is more of a silent type, but equally disturbed and at least ten times more misogynist. His behavior was mostly triggered by an awkward mother/son relationship. The flashback sequence in which the mommy colorfully explains to his one and only girlfriend how she and Frank make love ALL the time is easily the best part of the film. The mother is still watching over her boys, by the way, though she can only seen from behind or heard in the distance. In other words, if you know your classics
*cough* Psycho*cough*cough*
it's easy to guess the final denouement. The atmosphere of "Schoolgirls in Chains" is overall sleazy and brute, but the screenplay lacks suspense and suffers from too many dull moments. There's nudity, of course, but no real vulgar stuff.
Review of Schoolgirls in Chains
