After the sordid Prisoner 701 chose to bury its feminist morality under layers and layers of sleaze, the producers (with considerable input from Lady Scorpion herself, Meiko Kaji) went back to the drawing board for a much different approach. Jailhouse 41 picks up right where we left off; Scorpion’s in solitary after breaking out for the attempted murder of her duplicitous ex-beau, a corrupt police officer. Sure, that’s a slap in the face to authority, but the warden’s more pissed off about his missing right eyeball. If you really must know the convoluted events that led to said injury, you can consult the preceding entry in this series, but Jailhouse 41 doesn’t waste any time in re-establishing these conflicts. We don’t even have time for a title sequence before we’re thrown into the thick of things. There is, however, a cheeky Coen-esque title card that assures us the film is a work of fiction.

This was actually my introduction to the series, and I’d heartily recommend any Lady Scorpion neophytes skip the first chapter and go directly to this one. It’s hardly an intellectual challenge: Warden hates Scorpion, Scorpion silently endures whatever punishments he devises to “break her spirit”. Same as the first, only without lengthy scenes of degradation; Jailhouse 41 opts for an artsy, tasteful approach to female trauma. An early scene where she’s raped by a gang of loathsome guards wearing stockings over their face is horrifying not for the act in question, rather for the POV shot of the men surrounding her while screaming obscenities. Suddenly, all the sound cuts out and we adopt the distant perspective shared by her and the warden.

Whereas Prisoner 701 looked and felt exactly like the cheap Women in Prison pinky programmer it was meant to be, Jailhouse 41 does not linger within the walls of its titular concrete compound. By the end of the first reel, we already deeply despise the guards, and then come the bitchy fellow prisoners who correctly blame Scorpion for the ridiculous punishments they must also endure. Oba, the craziest one of all, seems to loathe our heroine with an otherworldly passion; perhaps she’s trying to overcompensate for her Sapphic desires? At any rate, the two rivals forge an immediate codependency after Oba assists Scorpion in breaking out of the police van. Natch, our Lady must strike the first blow with a kill later ripped off by Anton Chigurh, getting a bit of bloody satisfaction while bolstering the spirits of her sisters at the same time.

From there, the ladies lay waste to the van and begin their sprawling odyssey of castration mania, working their way through the countryside with the cops hot on their heels. In an interesting contrast, the violence against women is depicted as artistically as possible, whereas their blood-soaked revenge against those with Y chromosomes is almost uncomfortably graphic. Witness the fate of that poor fellow illuminated with brilliant blue light in the distance.

There’s no need to squint to make out what happened, the camera helpfully zooms in until you’re well aware of his fate, smashed testicles and all. Yet, in view of prior oppression, this could be seen as an entirely just punishment. Our band of escaped convicts carry untold amounts of sympathy yet we should never condone their actions. They’re all evil to the bone, even Lady Scorpion herself, and would turn on one another if they weren’t all codependent partners in Womanhood. When the girls stumble into a derelict shack late one afternoon for shelter, they’re greeted by the old lady of the house and given dinner. Then we in the audience are given a psychedelic Noh performance, with the mystical old maid chanting the crimes (of passion) committed by each woman in turn, recounting the acts of violence that led to their respective imprisonments. Save for Lady Scorpion, who remains a delightful enigma.

From there it just gets weirder and weirder.

Make no mistake: Jailhouse 41 is as obviously acid-influenced as Yellow Submarine or The Holy Mountain; those expecting more Prisoner 701 antics will be disappointed to find no clever usage of work lights or golf clubs, likewise for the marked lack of nudity or degradation. Logic does not come into play at any point, and all scenes with the cops are kept as short and jargon-free as possible. The colorful aesthetic, influenced by the work of Seijun Suzuki, delivers eye-popping compositions in every scene, and the epic sweep of the story gives this low-budget production a kind of grandeur not befitting of its Women in Prison trappings. Likewise the characters are more archetypal than three-dimensional, none more so than our heroine. She only speaks one line in the whole film.

Surprisingly, presumed villainess Oba is given the most development. After we learn she killed her husband and children in cold blood, she then pulls up her robe to expose the jagged scar left over from her DIY hysterectomy. Then this self-loathing female starts laughing hysterically. It’s a chilling scene that brings to light some of the subtext of the story; Jailhouse 41 deals with the burden of womanhood and explores gender politics, albeit in a simplistic manner. All the male characters are either disgusting horndogs or figures of fascist tyranny, set up to be appropriately punished by Lady Scorpion, self-appointed defender of oppressed women. If the symbolism is at times crashingly obvious (an act of sexual violence is represented by a yonic waterfall gushing red water) the cinematography and art direction are so stunning you won’t really care.

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, as the old axiom says, and Jailhouse 41 proves it beyond the faintest shadow of a doubt. Its juxtaposition of female empowerment and moral ambiguity lends some food for thought, but you sure as hell won’t have much time to mull over these things as the film rockets forward at an incredible pace, leading to a bus hijacking/hostage crisis/seige and a memorable scene in a landfill. Hallucinatory madness clashes with gritty authenticity in most every scene, giving the film a unique atmosphere of heightened reality. Even after most of the conflict works itself out, there’s still time for a side order of badass revenge; Lady Scorpion shows up dressed to kill with her sharpened phallus at the ready, paradoxically dooming herself by exacting punishment.

…And she looks great doing it. I have no idea why Jailhouse 41 isn’t more highly regarded; it transcends the whole scuzzy “pinky violence” subgenre and leaves other Women In Prison cheapies in the dust. With the sequel, Beast Stable, the psychedelic approach was abandoned in favor of an aesthetic owing more to Kinji Fukasaku, so this film is even more of an oddity. See it with the woman you love, especially if you’re a woman yourself.

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