Leofwine_draca SLAVE GIRLS (aka PREHISTORIC WOMEN) is undoubtedly one of the worst of all the Hammer Films productions; it's a cheap, cheerful, inordinately cheesy outing that sees a rugged adventurer hero captured by a tribe of savage warrior women who proceed to torture him until he manages to lead a slave revolt against them.I was most surprised to find out that this is the film that CARRY ON UP THE JUNGLE spoofs so well, memorably featuring Valerie Leon in much the same role as Martine Beswick here. The spoof is much funnier than this supposedly serious original. SLAVE GIRLS suffers from endless padding in terms of choreographed dance routines and native chanting, plus some absolutely awful special effects, from rubbery jungle plantation to a rhino attack at the climax which sees the rhino rolling along on a trolley.Sure, the film boasts plenty of attractive starlets in their fur bikinis (in a bid to attract male attention after the success of Raquel Welch in ONE MILLION YEARS B.C., no doubt) but the acting is very poor and the script even worse. You do have to wonder what they were thinking; this feels more like a cheap Monogram programmer of the 1940s than a colourful Hammer romp as it should have been.

jefffisher65-708-541158 Prehistoric Women is easily one of Hammer films worst efforts quality-wise, but since it's really an excuse to simply show off as many sexy, fur-bikini clad beauties as possible, who cares? No doubt it would help if one could have seen this on the big screen, around age 14 or so.In summary, hero David Marchand(Michael Latimere) is captured by tribesmen(apparently in British-controlled Africa somewhere), and is about to be slain when he's transported to the lost world of the brunette and blonde Amazons presumably by a lightning strike. The brunettes are led by remarkably evil Queen Kari(the remarkably sexy Martine Beswick), who unfortunately is exceptionally cruel a ruler - the brunettes hold all the blonde's in slavery having once been their slaves, if memory serves correctly. There does not seem to be a great many males left; what there are are kept in a cavern-prison chained up save, I assume, for the lucky few chosen for breeding stock from time to time.Our hero falls for blonde slave girl Saria(Edna Ronay), although he somehow resists the very evident charms of Queen Kari, who wishes him for her own(subservient) mate. He resists her, though, making one wonder seriously about his hormone levels, and is tossed into said-dungeon. Predictably, a slave revolt happens aided by a mass-escape of the surviving men. The tribe's White Rhino God appears during the mayhem at the climax, which leads to unfortunate results for Queen Kari when she tries to bow down to the beast.Somehow, David Marchand finds himself back in then-modern times, and - surprise - a blonde beauty he meets at a train depot is Saria!(or her reincarnation?) Many plot elements are not very clear as others have noted with glee, so one is never sure exactly what has really happened to Marchand. Of course, one imagines this film wasn't meant to be taken terribly seriously at all, but it would be fun to see the restored version if that is what's now available on disc. I rate this six stars simply for the display of beauty on hand, not for any intrinsic filmatic qualities. I shouldn't be surprised if many dark-haired ladies who somehow happen to view this cult film enjoy(maybe secretly) seeing the blonde's endure such rough treatment, though...

BA_Harrison In 1966, Hammer studios gave the world its cave-girl classic One Million Years B.C., which featured a bevy of fur bikini-clad beauties, including the pneumatic Raquel Welch and the lissom Martine Beswick. The next year, obviously unwilling to consign a wardrobe full of skimpy animal-skin costumes to the skip, they also made Prehistoric Women (AKA Slave Girls), a ridiculous jungle adventure which saw Beswick once again playing a wildcat with a nasty streak.Written and directed by Michael Carreras, Prehistoric Women is technically one of Hammer's weakest efforts: a poorly scripted studio-bound clunker with an unbelievably daft plot and some mind-numbingly bad performances. However, it is also one of those rare films that manages to be consistently entertaining simply thanks to its unrelenting awfulness.Michael Latimer plays David Marchand, a jungle guide who is taken captive by savage, white rhinoceros worshipping natives who intend to sacrifice him to their god. Just as he is about to be killed, David touches their sacred rhino statue, which freezes time and opens a doorway into a kingdom where a tribe of big-breasted, brunette beauties, led by the heartless Queen Kari (Beswick), have enslaved a tribe of equally-buxom blonde babes.After falling for a slave girl named Saria (Edina Ronay), and witnessing Kari's cruelty, David vows to help the blonde women overthrow their oppressors, a task made all the more difficult when he is clapped in irons for spurning Kari's sexual advances.Featuring loads of native song and dance numbers to pad out the action (including a nifty solo routine from Beswick, who might not be the prettiest of Hammer's women, but certainly has one hell of a hot bod!), the occasional cat-fight, a gloriously naff jungle battle, and a silly surprise ending that makes no sense whatsoever, this film is sheer nonsense from start to finish. But it's fun nonsense, which earns itself a rating of 6/10 from this easily pleased viewer.And, if nothing else, I did learn a vital lesson in jungle survival: never bow down in front of a charging rhino (even if it looks like it is made from papier-mâché and is being pulled along on a trolley!).

Bucs1960 This film makes it perfectly clear that blondes do not have more fun! The evil brunettes of the ruling tribe in some unamed African country (on the back lot) take all the blondes in the country as slaves as well as all the available men. Leading this group of nasties is the wonderful Martine Beswick, a staple in Hammer films who has a beauty that resembles that of the even more wonderful Barbara Steele. Queen Martine periodically makes human sacrifices of the unfortunate blondes and generally rules with an iron fist(and a whip which she cracks with menace).Into this happy kingdom stumbles a white hunter who immediately falls in love with one of the blonde slave girls and decides to put a stop to all the nonsense. He does so with dispatch and Queen Martine goes to the happy hunting ground on the horn of the white rhino of the alternate title of this film (Slave Girls of the White Rhinoceros).The symbolism in this film is hilarious......the Queen stroking the rhino horn, the cracking whip....it smacks of bondage and domination. It just adds another dimension to an already insane film. It is so much fun that I had to give it a higher rating than it deserves.