Switchblade Sisters

For all its Tarantino tongue-in-cheek violence and movie poster posturing, Switchblade Sisters (1975) could easily be a case study for a women’s issues in the workplace.  A new recruit, Maggie, rises to the top of the organization, outsmarting and outmuscling her male competitors, only to be sabotaged by her best friend, Lace, the woman she trusted the most.  Director Jack Hill stole from the best, lifting much of the gangland politics from Shakespeare’s Othello, but making sure to disguise it will plenty of chains, bullets and the aforementioned switchblades. 

 

The “dagger debs” – later rechristened “the Jezebels” after Maggie’s corporate takeover – are proud of their juvenile delinquent status.  But adult problems are looming on the horizon and the next arrest could land them all into the prison system.  The addition of Maggie causes an emotional rift when Dominic, head of the Silver Daggers, takes more than a passing interest, forcing Lace to choose between love, friendship and power.

 

Switchblade Sisters jumps between campy Roger Corman-style exploitation (bookended by an over-the-top prison riot and an all-out street assault complete with tanks and machine guns) and the quieter - and honestly more compelling - scenes involving the love/hate relationships between the girls in the gang.  Hill doesn’t make apologies for either gender in the end; both gangs are tragically self-destructive.  But he pulls out some convincing performances from the likes of Robbie Lee (whose subsequent voice acting work on the Smurfs and Rainbow Bright isn’t surprising) and Joanne Nail, whose kung-fu action pose is the stuff Tarantino dreams are made of.

 

Long overdue for a special edition, Arrow’s Blu-ray looks terrific and features a new commentary from astute female film critic Kat Ellinger, the archival documentary We Are the Jezebels, a location tour, interviews, still galleries, trailer and a collector’s booklet.

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