The great Yasuharu Hasebe carries the torch he burnt at Nikkatsu to Toei's "Female Convict Scorpion - Grudge Song", and the result is a very different Scorpion film that still manages to mythologize our beautiful heroine, Nami Matsushuima (Meiko Kaji). Hasebe's penchant for rape, perverse sexuality, torture and jazz scoring serves the plot of this entry very well, as does his fondness for hand-held camera-work. A porno theater projectionist, who has tangled with the police before, gives Nami safe harbor when she finds herself on the lam once again. A sexual relationship based on shared misery brings the two outsiders together, but when the projectionist is captured and tortured, he gives up Nami's hiding place and she is returned to jail after an exciting shoot-out. If you know Hasebe's work, you'll enjoy various sequences that would later be mirrored in the director's "Assault Jack The Ripper" (the body in the elevator shaft at the end) and "Raping!" (the rape of the prison warden by the police, and the erotic acts performed in mirrors). Hasebe's Scorpion is a looser, less surreal piece of work, but it is, nonetheless, a wonderful achievement. The finale, set in the wilderness against a baked, orange sky, is great cinema, as is the emotional conclusion where Nami's achingly beautiful theme song is reprised. As usual, the director's passion for jazz-fueled visuals is well served by composer Hajime Kaburagi's sensational score, which also detours into some of the most surreal territory yet trodden in a Scorpion film. Some say this is the weakest of the series; "some" just don't appreciate sleaze as art.
