9. Nazisploitation - Ilsa She Wolf of the SS (1975)
The ultimate example of a particularly obnoxious exploitation sub-genre, Ilsa She Wolf of the SS is a deeply offensive Nazisploitation movie which is so outrageous, it will leave your jaw on the floor. The film is based in a German Stalag where the ruthless Ilsa is Kommandant. There are two things going on in the camp. First, Ilsa is obsessed with the notion that women have a much higher threshold of pain than men and should therefore be able to fight alongside men in the frontline of combat. She and her medical crew perform nefarious experiments in the camp on the female inmates to prove her theory. Second, Ilsa is a sexually voracious nympho who has sex (which is close to rape) with the male inmates. She is looking for a man who can last all night - but unfortunately they usually end up ejaculating far too soon and for this terrible 'crime', Ilsa has them castrated. This is until she meets an inmate who can last the distance... I feel guilty rating Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS as a film. On the one hand it is sick and deeply offensive but on the other hand it is sheer unadulterated 1970s Grindhouse sleaze which is where I derive most of my film viewing pleasure. It is certainly not a film you would want to watch over and over again. I watched it once and then again about a year and a half later to see if it was as sick as I remembered. It was. The film deserves its outrageous reputation. Scene after scene of torture and experimentation is packed into its running time as well as plenty of nudity courtesy of Dyanne Thorne's sex crazed portrayal of Ilsa. Her knockers are truly gargantuan. But of course Silicon implants were all the rage in Nazi Germany. Despite the fact that the direction is staid, the acting is hammy and there is a major cheese factor, the inherent nastiness of Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS seeps through. The makers of the Italian Nazisploitation movies (with the possible exception of Gestapo's Last Orgy) would explode in joy to produce something as wonderfully putrid as Ilsa. In conclusion, despite its morally reprehensible tone, we must remember the film is a piece of Grindhouse cinema and it delivers the sleazy goods in abundance to the fans of exploitation cinema which is why it is THE quintessential Nazisploitation film.