Coventry In spite of the undeservedly and even ridiculously low rating of 3.7 out of 10 here on this website, at least most of the reviewers seem to agree with me that this is simply one of the greatest (undoubtedly even THE greatest) so-called "Women in Prison" exploitation classic ever made. Seriously, this sick puppy has literally everything you could possibly be looking for in a sleazy & shoddy exploitation flick: raw action, extreme violence, suspense, wondrously stereotypical characters, gratuitous nudity, steaming hot sex footage, campy music, suitably filthy set pieces and gloriously over-the-top performances from a dreamy all-star B-movie cast. Unlucky cherubic beauty Carol Henderson must serve 18 months in prison following a deadly car accident she caused, but she never could have dreamed she would end up in the most derailed and improperly run women's prison facility in the world! All sorts of putrid and impure business take place in this institution and, even worse, everyone gets away with everything! The head warden Bacman (John Vernon in an awesomely sneering role) built his office into a luxurious loft where he shoots private sex film starring the inmates and forces them to snitch on the others. His first captain – Stella Stevens – desperately wants to steal his position and does whatever she can to frame him. She and her lover Lester (played by Henry Silva who's the personification of sleaze) also run a very profitable escort service for which he smoothly sneaks out prisoners and rents them out to wealthy customers. Then there's another duo of wardens who pay tough chick Ericka (Sybil Danning) to rape and abuse defenseless new arrivals and then, last but not least of course, there's the usual type of conflicts between the prisoners mutually. You know; the gang of Ericka versus the black girls led by the tall-legged Tamara Dobson and Linda Blair's diplomatic attempts to unite them all together against the prison authorities. "Chained Heat" is a stupendously terrific and ultra-trashy classic in the field of 80's exploitation classics. Writer/director Paul Nicholas clearly wanted to pay tribute to the preceding 'Women in Prison' movies of the seventies (like, for example "Caged Heat" and "The Big Bird Cage") but actually surpassed all those titles in terms of dementia and sheer entertainment value. The film provides full frontal female nudity every couple of minutes and even the slightly more prominent ladies in the cast aren't too embarrassed to show a little bit of T&A. Personally, I sure as hell prefer gazing at a fully matured Linda Blair showering in prison rather than a 13-year-old version possessed by the devil and vomiting pea soup! "Chained Heat" comes with my highest possible recommendation, in case that wasn't made clear enough yet.

moonspinner55 Ugly women-of-the-cellblock flick rakes the bottom of the midnight-movie barrel, combining pulpy sleaze with the hoariest of girls-in-the-shower clichés. Linda Blair plays an innocent sent to jail (we learn offhandedly she was involved in running over some guy with her car), facing hard time in the Big House with some of the nastiest characters this side of a Russ Meyer pic. Blair is continually pawed at, punched, raped, humiliated and harassed. The dialogue is four-letter-word disgusting throughout, and the flick offers no let-up from its barrage of violence and stupidity. Still, some viewers see this as a camp classic, though perhaps its tongue isn't far enough in cheek. * from ****

richusa555 I was expecting something a lot more exciting then this. What a snoozer!! Very bad dialogue and terrible plot as this movie quickly goes in the wrong direction by dwelling too much on racial tensions between the inmates. This movie could have been better served with just the evil warden scenario.Another problem is that this flick needed more attractive inmates, not just two or three to make up for the ten other ugly ones. Iam not sure if they were trying to make a realistic movie about a corrupt female prison and then it went bad or what, but much of this movie never made sense. The poorly written lines and the boring fight scenes makes this a forgettable movie. I was really looking forward to a good WiP movie and instead I felt really let down.

Infofreak I'm a sucker for 60s and 70s exploitation movies - Russ Meyer, Roger Corman, Jess Franco, Jack Hill, Larry Cohen, all those guys. While there was some great movies made in the 80s, very few exploitation movies from that era reached those dizzying heights. Crud like 'Porky's' and 'Hollywood Hot Tubs' were the order of the day. No thanks! However 'Chained Heat' is simply sensational, comparable to the classics of the genre and will appeal to discerning trash lovers everywhere.Newbie Linda Blair ('The Exorcist' kid all grown up) enters a tough women's prison, where lesbianism, drug use, racial tension, violence and sneering are prevalent. The white inmates are ruled by tough-talking Erika (Sybil Danning, star of more b-grade nudies than you can shake a stick at), the black ones by tough-talking Dutchess (the fabulous Tamara Dobson of 'Cleopatra Jones' fame). Also in the mix are veterans John Vernon (at his sleaziest!), Stella Stevens, and Henry Silva. The superior cast is one of the things that makes 'Chained Heat' so great. The other is the sheer ludicrousness of it! The best women-in-prison movie I've ever seen. Highly recommended!