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Without giving away too much about the ending of Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS, let's just say that it isn't naturally conducive to a sequel, at least one featuring Dyanne Thorne's titular character (which I must regretfully inform you might be considered a pun). Yet here she is, back and as alive as ever, in Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks. This one trades the World War II setting for a more contemporary tale (contemporary during its original release, anyway) in which Ilsa finds herself part of a despotic regime led by the evil Sheik El Sharif (Jerry Delony, whose other notable screen credits include Richard Linklater's Slacker and a Ray Dennis Steckler porno that sounds even more dismal than the ones I've seen). We know he's evil not just because he relishes any opportunity for cruelty (observed when he has a man covered in oil and lit on fire while he watches approvingly with some pretty sweet sunglasses) and keeps a harem full of sex slaves (among them Colleen Brennan, then sexploitation star and later hardcore pornstar with a pleasingly toothy smile she sadly doesn't get to flash here, and Uschi Digard, the Russ Meyer regular introduced here as a "Scandinavian love goddess"). We know he's evil because he also keeps oil production artificially low.
This naturally raises the concern of America and other western nations, and dispatched to meet with the sheik are a Henry Kissinger analogue and his hunky American aide. Now, to call this a satire of the 1973 oil crisis would be extremely generous, although one might find an inkling of resonance in how the movie shows America's willingness to tolerate repressive regimes when convenient to its own interests, even if the movie doesn't argue this with any elegance. Personally, I'm a sucker for movies that awkwardly shoehorn in real world figures, and in casting the hammiest possible actor as the Kissinger stand-in (whose onscreen highlight is a tantrum he throws by flailing his arms and making teapot-like poses in exasperation) and depicting him as a pedophile to boot...well, folks, I laughed. Sometimes the low blows land.
The hunky American aide catches the eye of Ilsa, and the resulting affair (which features sex scenes with equal opportunity nudity, to their credit) catches the ire of El Sharif, who has both of them tortured (the aide is menaced by a tarantula, Ilsa is molested by an undead-looking hunchback). The two of them then scheme to get their revenge, and the movie climaxes like the original with an uprising, with Ilsa's (mostly topless) harem taking up arms against the palace guards (many of whom have their faces hidden by keffiyehs, I assume to recycle extras and keep costs down). This is followed by an ending that like the original has a certain amount of irony, but is perhaps less dour, depending on which part of the geopolitical arena you sympathize with.
This hits a lot of the same beats as the original movie, interspersing a number of sexually charged torture sequences throughout the plot, and featuring a male challenger for Ilsa as well as an uprising, although Ilsa is on the other side of the conflict this time around. And like the original this is directed fairly artlessly, although the higher production values give this a less dingy feeling, occasionally rising to the ambience of a Middle Eastern themed Playboy photoshoot. And while Thorne, with her arch, forceful screen presence, is again the primary reason to see this, she's paired with a pretty fun foil in Delony, who matches her for sadistic teeth-gnashing glee. And on the whole, this is a lot more palatable than the original, toning down Ilsa's Nazism and turning her into a general dominatrix/authoritarian type (she makes a few references to her preference for Aryan men, but otherwise seems tolerant of the diverse female cast; this does however contain some pretty negative portrayals of Arabs, so it is not without its offensive qualities). The tortures are also less extreme this time around, likely in an attempt to secure an R-rating instead of the X the original was slapped with. (Sadistic highlights this time around include a scene where Ilsa scares some new slaves with a cute little mouse in a cage, explosives jammed into private parts, and a scene where some of the slaves have their chastity belts unlocked, in a shameless ploy to show some bush closeups.)
All that being said, even though this is better made, I suspect Ilsa would not be quite the icon as she is were this the first movie, as the original's junkier construction lets her presence shine in a way this better rounded movie does not. And while the campier tone here makes this easier to swallow for most people, it arguably loses the sense of transgression of the original, which was channeling Nazi atrocities for kicks. I'm not trying to defend the original, which I think is pretty bad, or its genre, which I find morally reprehensible, but merely to note that the earlier movie got a reaction out of me that this one did not.
Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (Edmonds, 1976)
Without giving away too much about the ending of Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS, let's just say that it isn't naturally conducive to a sequel, at least one featuring Dyanne Thorne's titular character (which I must regretfully inform you might be considered a pun). Yet here she is, back and as alive as ever, in Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks. This one trades the World War II setting for a more contemporary tale (contemporary during its original release, anyway) in which Ilsa finds herself part of a despotic regime led by the evil Sheik El Sharif (Jerry Delony, whose other notable screen credits include Richard Linklater's Slacker and a Ray Dennis Steckler porno that sounds even more dismal than the ones I've seen). We know he's evil not just because he relishes any opportunity for cruelty (observed when he has a man covered in oil and lit on fire while he watches approvingly with some pretty sweet sunglasses) and keeps a harem full of sex slaves (among them Colleen Brennan, then sexploitation star and later hardcore pornstar with a pleasingly toothy smile she sadly doesn't get to flash here, and Uschi Digard, the Russ Meyer regular introduced here as a "Scandinavian love goddess"). We know he's evil because he also keeps oil production artificially low.
This naturally raises the concern of America and other western nations, and dispatched to meet with the sheik are a Henry Kissinger analogue and his hunky American aide. Now, to call this a satire of the 1973 oil crisis would be extremely generous, although one might find an inkling of resonance in how the movie shows America's willingness to tolerate repressive regimes when convenient to its own interests, even if the movie doesn't argue this with any elegance. Personally, I'm a sucker for movies that awkwardly shoehorn in real world figures, and in casting the hammiest possible actor as the Kissinger stand-in (whose onscreen highlight is a tantrum he throws by flailing his arms and making teapot-like poses in exasperation) and depicting him as a pedophile to boot...well, folks, I laughed. Sometimes the low blows land.
The hunky American aide catches the eye of Ilsa, and the resulting affair (which features sex scenes with equal opportunity nudity, to their credit) catches the ire of El Sharif, who has both of them tortured (the aide is menaced by a tarantula, Ilsa is molested by an undead-looking hunchback). The two of them then scheme to get their revenge, and the movie climaxes like the original with an uprising, with Ilsa's (mostly topless) harem taking up arms against the palace guards (many of whom have their faces hidden by keffiyehs, I assume to recycle extras and keep costs down). This is followed by an ending that like the original has a certain amount of irony, but is perhaps less dour, depending on which part of the geopolitical arena you sympathize with.
This hits a lot of the same beats as the original movie, interspersing a number of sexually charged torture sequences throughout the plot, and featuring a male challenger for Ilsa as well as an uprising, although Ilsa is on the other side of the conflict this time around. And like the original this is directed fairly artlessly, although the higher production values give this a less dingy feeling, occasionally rising to the ambience of a Middle Eastern themed Playboy photoshoot. And while Thorne, with her arch, forceful screen presence, is again the primary reason to see this, she's paired with a pretty fun foil in Delony, who matches her for sadistic teeth-gnashing glee. And on the whole, this is a lot more palatable than the original, toning down Ilsa's Nazism and turning her into a general dominatrix/authoritarian type (she makes a few references to her preference for Aryan men, but otherwise seems tolerant of the diverse female cast; this does however contain some pretty negative portrayals of Arabs, so it is not without its offensive qualities). The tortures are also less extreme this time around, likely in an attempt to secure an R-rating instead of the X the original was slapped with. (Sadistic highlights this time around include a scene where Ilsa scares some new slaves with a cute little mouse in a cage, explosives jammed into private parts, and a scene where some of the slaves have their chastity belts unlocked, in a shameless ploy to show some bush closeups.)
All that being said, even though this is better made, I suspect Ilsa would not be quite the icon as she is were this the first movie, as the original's junkier construction lets her presence shine in a way this better rounded movie does not. And while the campier tone here makes this easier to swallow for most people, it arguably loses the sense of transgression of the original, which was channeling Nazi atrocities for kicks. I'm not trying to defend the original, which I think is pretty bad, or its genre, which I find morally reprehensible, but merely to note that the earlier movie got a reaction out of me that this one did not.