One of the wildest women-behind-bars bonanzas ever, 10 Violent Women comes from cult director Ted V. Mikels, a master of sordid drive-in style affairs, whose credits include The Doll Squad, Astro Zombies and the ever-popular The Worm Eaters.

It’s no wonder, then, that this outing is downright bizarre – part caper flick, part crime spoof and still another part prison drama.  The best moments, however, can be found in the outrageously overwrought prison drama, where the performances, action and dialogue are so overdone, it’ll remind you of Cartoon Corners.

Seems that a few of our 10 Violent Women are framed or stealing a priceless ring from a Beverly Hills jewelry store.  They soon find themselves in a seedy penitentiary – all-gals, natch – where an ultra-butch matron and her Quasimodo-like religious-fanatic sidekick make sure they, er, don’t get out of hand.

Or course, all they do is get out of hand, fighting other inmates and acting downright nasty to their supervisors. So a little topless punishment is in order.  The matron, who looks like Maude’s Bea Arthur if she were a dominatrix, enjoys forcing our vilent women to crawl on the floor to her.  Then she smack them – SWACCCCKK!! – with a riding crop, and orders them to make her day in creepy dyke-kitsch fashion.

Viewers may squirm in their sofas during the goofy opening heist plot or find it hard to laugh during the spoofy epilogue, which finds our two main violent women living happily ever after.  But aficionados of women’s prison pix won’t be disappointed with most of this “Jailhouse Schlock.”