Sweet young innocent Jenny Williams (a perky and appealing performance by Linda Carol) finds herself incarcerated at a harsh juvenile detention facility where she runs afoul of both the vicious staff and predatory inmates alike. Writer/director Tom DeSimone relates the entertainingly trashy story at a zippy pace, maintains a perfectly campy and over-the-top tongue-in-cheek tone throughout, and makes the most out of the blithely outrageous lowbrow humor by providing a wealth of hilarious lines and suitably grotesque caricatures. Moreover, it's acted with gusto by the enthusiastic cast: Legendary punk rocker Wendy O. Williams makes a strong impression with her sensationally snarly portrayal of formidable top con Charlie Chambliss, Pat Ast deliciously hams it up as monstrous head matron Edna, and Sybil Danning has a ball as the strict bible-quoting Warden Sutter, plus there are sturdy contributions from Sherri Stoner as timid and fragile teen runaway Lisa, Charlotte McGinnis as the compassionate Dr. Norton, Tiffany Helm as mean flunky Andrea 'Fish' Eldridge, Laurie Schwartz as the sarcastic Nicky, and Darcy DeMoss as the sassy Karen 'Knox' Charmin. Better still, DeSimone ably covers all the pleasingly sleazy babes-behind-bars bases: Tasty gratuitous female nudity, ferocious catfights, a sizzling group shower set piece (look fast for an uncredited Michelle Bauer in said shower scene), hot gals slinking about in skimpy lingerie, and a rousing climactic riot with the definite astounding highlight being when O. Williams commandeers a bus and stands on its roof as it speeds towards a watchtower. Both Howard Wexler's slick cinematography and Dan Siegel's robust melodramatic score are up to par. The cool rocking soundtrack likewise seriously smokes, with several of the songs sneered out by O. Williams (the theme song in particular is simply fantastic). An absolute wacky'n'tacky hoot.

"Reform School Girls" is a deliciously exaggerated entry in the Women In Prison genre. It's all very campy material that the majority of the actors, to their credit, actually play quite straight. The winks start with the fact that its writer / director Tom DeSimone, had previously made another classic, "The Concrete Jungle". Here, DeSimone, cast, and crew clearly have a ball with the trashy 'n' flashy story. Linda Carol plays Jenny, a newcomer to a reform school named Pridemore Juvenile Facility, who mixes it up with both the overbearing head matron Edna (corpulent, big haired Pat Ast, who's an absolute riot) and swaggering top dog convict Charlie (punk rocker Wendy O. Williams, perfectly suited to the role). Also among the main cast is the B movie goddess Sybil Danning, adding to the in- joke tone of the movie seeing that she plays the ruthless warden here and had already played a convict in the earlier "Chained Heat". Ast, Williams, and Danning are a superb trio and make this fun to watch. Carol, by comparison, by playing a more or less decent person (although tough enough to try standing up to the antagonists), comes off as less entertaining. Ast delights in the over the top nature of Edna, setting a stuffed animal on fire and stomping the life out of a real one. DeSimone delivers enough shower scenes / nudity / sex, melodrama, and violence to keep fans content. The sometimes hilarious script features some choice and quotable dialogue. The soundtrack is absolutely kick ass, with Williams singing such ditties as the anthemic "It's My Life" and the title track. The supporting cast aren't slouches, either; Charlotte McGinnis is the concerned Dr. Norton, Sherri Stoner the young innocent Lisa, Denise Gordy the sassy Claudia, Laurie Schwartz the spunky Nicky, and two "Friday the 13th" franchise alumni, Tiffany Helm ("A New Beginning") and Darcy DeMoss ("Jason Lives") play Charlie's flunkies. The movie progresses agreeably through various sordid episodes before coming to a rousing conclusion. In any event, one element you have to appreciate about this sort of thing is the hotness factor of the inmates. It's not exactly boring at any moment, either. There are certainly no complaints from this viewer. Eight out of 10.

Cheesy 1980s women-in-prison flick. It's kind of fun. Very much modeled on 1950's seminal wip film Caged, this one stars Linda Carol as a good girl who gets caught up in her boyfriend's crime and gets sent to jail for it where she must deal with a violent lesbian gang (led by punk star Wendy O. Williams), a domineering warden (Sybil Danning) and a sadistic headmistress (Pat Ast). At first, the ridiculous lingerie that all the prisoners wear and all the shower scenes are amusing, but like most low budget schlock it starts to grow tiresome after a while. A couple of great sequences keep it from getting unwatchable, especially the one where Carol has sex with this incredibly ugly dude (who I think is actually supposed to be a stud) who is going to help her escape. Thankfully, the part where Ast discovers the inmates' pet kitten (as happens in Caged) is freaking hilarious, and everything from there to the way over-the-top climax is bad movie gold. I spent much of the movie wondering where the heck I'd seen supporting actress Sherri Stoner before. She looked so damned familiar. Apparently she was the live-action model for Ariel in The Little Mermaid (www.radix.net/~koalatek/sstoner.jpg)! She also voiced Slappy the Squirrel in Animaniacs!

My friends and I are always looking for the diamond in the rough (as it were), that one movie that's just so bad it serves as the topic of conversation for the next few days. I read a few comments after viewing this movie and don't think people realized: This movie is exactly what it claimed to be.Sure it's hardly an example of a "good" movie, but the increasing ridiculousness of the story was matched only by the quality of the cinematography. Sure they could have spent more time on a foley stage, but when you're looking at a room full of naked women showering, who cares? The only gripe was about one character who obviously didn't belong in a juvenile detention center. As my friend pointed out, they neglected to tell her it was reform school, not old school.All in all, get some friends, get some buds and prepare to be entertained. The only thing missing from this reform school is a giant tub of Jell-O.