The Woman Hunt (1972)

Boring, gruesome, mean-spirited, and sleazy, the grade-Z exploitation thriller The Woman Hunt is part of a long tradition of stories about people hunting other people for sport, only this time there’s an ugly element of misogyny added for spice. Yes, the title should be taken literally: The Woman Hunt is about repulsive dudes who get off on stalking and slaughtering pretty young ladies. Set in the Philippines and directed by prolific Filipino hack Eddie Romero, The Woman Hunt features frequent screen partners John Ashley and Sid Haig, alongside a number of relatively anonymous costars. Ashley and Haig play Tony and Silas, thugs who kidnap women for a rich psycho named Spyros (Eddie Garcia), and Spyros is the dude who arranges for wealthy customers to hunt the ladies whom Tony and Silas have obtained. (Abetting Tony and Silas is a third crook, played by Ken Metcalf.) Predictably, Tony has a crisis of conscience when he develops feelings for a woman he kidnapped, eventually turning against Spyros by helping several women escape. Thereafter, Spyros and his trigger-happy pals pursue the fugitives, so jungle-hunt action is intercut with drab scenes of friction among the fugitives. Every so often, the movie is punctuated with a gory kill or a nude scene, but even going so far as to call the acting and filmmaking inept would require giving the folks behind The Woman Hunt too much credit. Considering how much lurid spectacle is woven into the DNA of this movie’s premise, it’s a wonder that The Woman Hunt generates so little excitement. Making a movie this dull from an idea so shamelessly sensationalistic requires special gifts.

The Woman Hunt: LAME