Review by Crites | Available from Mondo Macabro
Opening on the alluring note of the trial of a naked blond found guilty of violating the covenants of her sect and led away to some unspeakable torment, GIRL SLAVES… promises to be sheer exploitation in the forbidden Seventies tradition. From this sensationally seedy introduction we move to another setting, to find a pair of coeds driving through mountain scenery en route to a bit of a university holiday.
Stopping at an archaic and uninviting pub for coffee and mulled wine, the girls are warned away from the nearby village by the pub's owner. Ignoring him the girls proceed through town, and somehow find themselves lost along the nighttime roads. Forced to bed down in an abandoned barn, no sooner have they literally hit the hay than Anna (Michele Perello) seduces her younger friend Francoise (Mireille Saunin) and we're in for a very brief bit of erotica before morning.
But in the morning Anna is nowhere to be found; the only person about is the effeminate little hunchback who'd been giving them the stink-eye in the pub – and presiding over the opening trial. Scampering through the woods the hunchback leads Francoise to the coastline across from which an island castle stands. He then disappears, leaving her alone with an unmanned rowboat. She steps into the small boat, and as if waiting especially for her it carries her across the water to the island where maidens in pastel gowns escort her inside the castle.
In one of the castle chambers the hunchback, Gurth (Alfred Baillou), directs a softcore lesbian orgy, while in another part of the castle Francoise is toyed with by a mysterious woman who seems to have the run of the citadel, not to mention the young damsels within it. Morgane (Dominique Del Pierre) subjects her young guest to much vague circular speech, and after bewildering her with her ramblings stuns her even more by breaking out the wine and a hookah. When she passes out, Francoise is carried away to bed. (But that's all we see of that.)
Elsewhere in the castle, down in the dungeon, we find Anna kept in silken bondage, stubbornly refusing the girl cult's offer of immortality and eternal life in the castle of ageless women despite the pressures applied to her. Hearing Anna's cries Francois awakens and wanders around the castle chambers in her nightgown until she finds a way out of the palace. But she cannot find the boat that she arrived upon, so braving the icy water she swims to shore and begins running through the forest, only to find Morgane waiting for her with flowers, wine and candles wherever she stops to rest. As if fated to do so, Francois returns to the castle.
The other ladies of the citadel, jealous of Morgane's intentions of having Francois join the fold, conspire with Gurth to allow the girl to escape during the great celebration planned for that evening. Led through the castle by Morgane on their way to the festival Francois comes across Anna, only to learn that she's already pledged her soul to Morgane and is content to remain there for all eternity. Together they all take in a pageant of sorts, with Morgane's many women performing poetry, dance and erotic acts in a great underground meeting hall.
Later, as the party continues, Francoise gets it on with a member of Morgane's inner circle, then makes away with two of the three magic talismans the circle holds; an enchanted tunic renders her invisible and an amulet gives her control over the boat, but without the topaz globe she won't be able to leave the surrounding forest (smell enough like a fairytale yet?). Slinking about invisibly, Francoise listens to Morgane rave at her pending escape and sentence Gurth to a horrible fate for his complicity.
When Gurth has been tied up and left alone Francoise seeks him out, whereupon the hunchback gives her his magical "ring of life" that, once she reaches the forest, will summon an enchanted stallion to carry her "across the border of the real and the imagined." Of course, by giving away the ring Gurth gives up his life, but as he's been pining for Morgane for centuries it's by now pretty clear he's never going to master the old witch and so would gladly thwart her instead.
Francoise makes it out of the castle and lets the magic boat guide her to the opposite shore, touches the ring of life to the mystical log, summons the horse and rides back to the human world. But having seen what she's seen of both worlds, will she really decide to stay?
This "Classic of Erotic Horror" was easy enough to get behind at first; lesbian witchcraft, bondage, soul-stealing… But from the less-than softcore copout of the early barn scene you can tell that this film is going to be more tease than titillation. Frankly, from a much-hyped unrated 'cult classic' I'd hoped for a little more. What you get with the promising title GIRL SLAVES… is an inexplicit unexplainable fairytale – which is rather boring, actually. The girls are sexy enough, even if a couple of them are somewhat hatchet-faced, but they don't get naked nearly often enough. And when they do, very little happens. A very fancified and somewhat tedious European production.
Presented in anamorphic widescreen, in French with English subtitles, GIRL SLAVES… comes with several bonus features. There's a bit of production history by noted cult cinema author Pete Tombs, an interview with director Gantillion, theatrical trailer, stills gallery and background information on cast and crew, and some 'rare' deleted and lost scenes.
There's also a bonus short film, Gantillion's first effort UN COUPLE D'ARTISTES (AN ARTISTIC COUPLE). 20-year-old Catherine takes a room and a position as caretaker at a kindly old couple's home, only to be gassed and transformed her very first night. Brief and well-executed, the short is marked not only by its surprising twist ending but by clever cinematic touches like the nightmarish hallucination sequence wherein the grotesque masks of her hosts leer over Catherine as the drug first takes effect.
A good effort, however not quite good enough to salvage the rest of the package. Definitely a 'rent-before-you-buy' type of deal here.
