Laikals
The greatest movie ever made..!
Myron Clemons
A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.
Quiet Muffin
This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.
Falconeer
'Criminal Woman: Killing Melody' is a strong entry in the 'Pinky Violence' box set, mostly due to the presence of both Reiko Ike, and the amazing Miki Sugimoto, as rivals/comrades. This film is a more straight forward revenge tale, and it moves at a good pace. Reiko Ike stars as Maki, a woman out for revenge against a Yakuza gang responsible for her fathers death. The original Zero Woman, Miki Sugimoto exudes a strange elegant quality in this one, as the wife of the Yakuza boss. The two wildcats meet for the first time in prison, and than again on the outside, when Maki's revenge plan begins to to take form. Reiko Ike is tough & uncompromising in this one, bent on wiping out the gangsters, while Massayo (Sugimoto) must retain a cool exterior; she doesn't really want any harm to come to her former cell mate, as she can respect the other woman's strength. At the same time, she feels some loyalty to her husband, or so we think. Miki Sugimoto remains my favorite 'Pink Heroine'. There is such strength in her voice, and in this one, much of her body is tattooed! Before i watched this I was afraid that it would be marred with silly comedic overtones, something which in my opinion ruined 'Delinquent Girl Boss: Worthless To Confess'. But there is none of that silliness here, just a straight forward approach, with fine melodramatic overtones, as well as some great sleaze. Not nearly as sadistic as 'Terrifying Girls Highschool', which is my personal favorite in the collection. But there are those moments that are expected from this genre, in particular a scene where Miki Sugimoto burns Reiko Ike's breasts with a lit cigarette. 'Criminal Woman: Killing Melody' is a classic 'pink' film.
fertilecelluloid
This Cormanesque exploitation flick from Atsushi Mihori is fast paced, stylishly directed, and never dull. Reiko Ike plays a woman who recruits her ex-cell mates to to take revenge on the yakuza thug, Oba (Ryoji Hayama), who killed her father. The women, a feisty, sexy bunch, go to great lengths to destabilize Hayama's organization before annihilating each member one by one. As was common in Toei programmers of the time, there is some torture and graphic nastiness, although this pic doesn't come close to the glorious excesses of "Zero Woman: Red Handcuffs". The gorgeous Miki Sugimoto, who plays the yakuza boss's main squeeze, acts in an unofficial capacity here to assist the angry women. A scene in which she pretends to torture Ike by stubbing cigarettes out on her breasts is a stand-out. Although disjointed in parts and contrived, it is a solid piece of female-centric entertainment.
EVOL666
CRIMINAL WOMAN: KILLING MELODY isn't my favorite of the PINKY VIOLENCE box-set...but it's still a great film. I honestly haven't seen a pinky film yet that wasn't entertaining and full of what I like to see, namely - tits-and-ass, violence, and a decent storyline. This entry is a lot more straight-forward than some of the others (which will be a plus to some - I personally dig the more "intricate" story lines...) and will definitely be of interest to any pinky fans out there.Maki's dad was killed by the local Oba yakuza clan. Maki took revenge by trying to kill the leader but only ended up stabbing a henchman. She's sent to jail, and on her release still has plans for vengeance against the Oba leader. Hooking up with some of her old "girl-gang" pals, she hatches a plan to pit Oba's crew with another local yakuza clan for her own ends...KILLING MELODY has all the requisite things that pinky fans crave. Tons of hot nekkid Asian women and a good bit of violence. Again, the storyline was a little to simple for my taste, but the film is still enjoyable as a whole. If you've dug the other entries in the box-set or are a pinky fan in general, you'll wanna peep this one too...7.5/10
christopher-underwood
Fine all action, sex and violence Japanese style with real style. Simple yet effective this is, for once, a fairly straight forward tale of revenge with the super women to the fore. Big cat fight at the start is matched by a rematch at the end and everything in between is just pure fun. Bits of nasty violence, the cigarette stub and threat of chainsaw were surprises but mainly fast moving with decent mix of s&v. Nice sequence to illustrate our heroine having to go on the game to earn the dosh to set up the action. Instead of any boring build up with sad undertones we get a quick montage of humps and payments from US soldiers uniform pockets.
