Bitch Slap

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Three gorgeous women in the middle of a desert with a beaten, nearly naked man in the trunk of their hot rod. As each gets out of the car, there is a long, slow-motion lingering shot, starting at each woman's long, shapely legs, tight bottoms, sliding up to ample bosoms, and finally reaching their faces.

...thus begins Bitch Slap, a 2009 movie that had a very limited initial release, but made quite an impression at various film festivals and eventually made it to DVD release in March, 2010.

The makers of this film, alumni of Sam Raimi's Hercules and Xena franchises, sat down one day, between projects, and tried to think: "how do we make a movie that people will watch with a limited budget and using only day shoots?" The answer, of course, is to simply put sexy girls Hel, Trixie, and Camero in revealing outfits in the middle of the desert, then have them fight, flaunt, and fornicate their way through a convoluted, Troperiffic plot.

Of particular note here is the involvement of Badass kiwi Action Girl stuntwoman and fight choreographer Zoe Bell. The producers again called in favors from their Xena: Warrior Princess days; she was Lucy Lawless's stunt double. Her influence and expertise is one of the things that elevates this movie from mere exploitation schlock to awesome exploitation schlock.

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Bitch Slap provides examples of:

• Apocalypse How: There's a cannister of Nanomachines that will turn every living person on an entire continent into a gray paste.
  • Pinky later implies it was all a hoax to get Hel and Camaro in position to get them their sword back.
• Action Girl: Camero, Hel, Kinki, and Pinky.
• Action Dress Rip: Hel, the better to become a Kick Chick.
• Amazon Brigade: The secret agent group, Flesh Force Foxy.
• Ax Crazy: Camero. Pinky, too.
• Badass: Camaro, Hel, and Pinky.
• Bait and Switch Lesbians: There is a chance that Trixie might fall for the handsome cop in the end. In this movie? Fat chance.
• Bare Your Midriff: Camero and Kinki (for starters).
• BFG: Hel's "K-14 Corsair rail gun... carbon fiber mounts... hellfire damping system... and Zion laser scope. " Also qualifies as an Impossibly Cool Weapon.
• Big Damn Heroes: Just when all appears lost, Deputy Fuchs emerges from the flames, weapon in hand, shirt half blown off, to save the day, and gets rewarded with a shuriken to the chest as part of the Twist Ending.
• Biker Babe: Camero. Plus her bike doubles as an Improbable Weapon in one flashback scene.
• Bi the Way: Kinki
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Trixie
• Bittersweet Ending: True, everyone except Trixie and Hel die bloodily, and Trixie is revealed to actually be Pinky and she leaves Hel sobbing in the desert.... but Hel's not in a terrible position. There are, presumably, at least two functional cars in the near vicinity (Hot Wire and Kinki's, and Deputy Fuchs's) and the rest of Gage's cache seems to be untouched. And the nanomachines are missing, but not activated. At the least, she can get herself to safety (and solvency) if she hurries.
• Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Trixie is brunette, Hel is redheaded and while Camero isn't blonde per se, she has the lightest hair.
• Bury Your Lesbians: Averted. Lesbians die, yes, but as many or more live.
• Camera Abuse: Camero kills Kinki with a machine gun, and paints the lens red in the process.
• Cast Full of Lesbian: Nearly every female character is obviously a lesbian. Well, Kinki is probably bi. We're not sure about the midget and the showgirl at the Glory Hole.
• Cat Fight: at one point during Camero and Hel's knock-down, drag-out brawl(s), there is, incongruosly, a cat's yowl out of nowhere.
• Catholic School Girls Rule: Kinki wears the tiniest Catholic schoolgirl outfit one can achieve and still cover the naughty bits.
• Chivalrous Pervert: Deputy Fuchs, the cop that offers to help the ladies is revealed to be a big fan of Trixie's stage show. Up to that point, he's been merely a Clueless Deputy.
• Clothing Damage: In spades. Several instances simply result in more flesh being revealed from attacks that one would assume to be normally fatal.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Mostly Gage.
• Combat Stilettos: Hel fights Camero in 'em. In sand, no less.
• Complete Monster: Pinky.
• Depraved Bisexual: Kinki.
• Designated Girl Fight: Averted. ALL of the main characters are female, the fights between them are merely the baddest, nastiest, and most ridiculous.
• Did Not Do the Research: While attributable to Stylistic Suck, watching the "railgun" eject automatic rifle cartridges and hearing a Japanese sword called a "naganata" by someone who presumably knows better can be jarring.
• Discount Lesbians: Averted. Yep, they're lesbians.
• Everybody Remembers the Stripper: Probably the main reason why this movie will be remembered. In-movie example: The cop remembers Trixie because he saw her strip show.
• Fan Service: And how! Just as an example of the lengths they go to for this trope, at one point the three leads have a five minute water fight, in the middle of the desert, drenching all of them, while they're worried that someone might be coming after them.
• Fiery Redhead: Hel. The "making of" documentary says that both the actress, Erin Cummings, and the producers came up with the idea that Hel should be a redhead separately, just before shooting.
• Flashback Effects: The multitude of flashback sequences are obviously filmed on green screen, partially because it's cheaper for all those location shots, and partially because of camp value.
• Girl-On-Girl Is Hot: Trixie likes to watch women fight each other. Also she likes other stuff, too.
• Girls Behind Bars: How Camero and Hel first met.
• Girls Love: The Love Triangle beteween the main three is pretty convoluted, too.
• Girls with Guns: Yeah.
• Girl with Psycho Weapon: Kinki's flying-guillotine yo-yo.
• Gratuitous Engrish: Averted, since most of Kinki's dialog is non-subtitled Japanese.
• Groin Attack: Performed on girls during fights (including one done solely by teeth).
• Guns Akimbo: Hel, during the Glory Hole shootout. Dressed as a Vegas showgirl, no less.
• Has Two Mommies: Implied at one point with Trixie's daughter.
• Hey It's That 90s Action Show Cast Member: The main cast of both Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess have roles of various sizes, almost entirely because of the directors' past relationships with them.
• Hide Your Lesbians: Quite averted. This movie doesn't know the meaning of the word "subtext".
• I Shall Taunt You: Pretty much everything Camero says to Trixie.
• Jiggle Show: Every single shot is choreographed to show how supple, bountious, and flexible the leading ladies are.
• Katanas Are Just Better: Pinky's sword.
• Kick Chick: Fight trainer Zoe Bell took advantage of Erin Cummings' real-life background as a cheerleader when choreographing the No Holds Barred Beatdowns.
• Lipstick Lesbian: Trixie. They're all pretty feminine, though.
• Lovely Angels: It starts off with Hel and Camero looking like they're going to be Lovely Angels. Things go downhill before that happens.
• Ludicrous Gibs: What happens when Camero kills a goon by shredding him with the rear wheel of her motorcycle. For extra added Gorn, said goon's girlfriend is drenched with his blood.
• Made of Explodium: The T-bird, when Hel shoots an RPG into it. Followed by Gage's trailer, when the gasoline canisters around it catch fire.
• Magnetic Weapons: Hel finds a rail gun under a trailer home.
• Male Gaze: The entire point, really. Girls and guns, what more does a man want?
• Me Love You Long Time: White Hot Wire and Japanese Kinki.
• Mini-Dress of Power: Hel and Trixie.
• Murder the Hypotenuse: Camero gets it in mind to resolve her issues with Hel and Trixie in this manner.
• Naughty Nuns: In a flashback, Camero hides out in a convent. Hilarity Ensues.
• Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Hot Wire. Mohawk AND cataract AND scars AND Tourettes Shitcock Syndrome AND guns.
• Nipple-and-Dimed: Despite being one of the most Fanservicey movies ever made, there's only one shot of an actual, unclothed female nipple in even the Unrated Edition. Made up for with a whole lotta Amazing Colossal Cleavage shots.
• Non-Fatal Explosions: Almost to the level of Looney Tunes. Camero and Deputy Fuchs are both caught in massive explosions, but emerge with no visible damage other than charred clothing.
• Noodle Incident: For a long while, it looks like the Glory Hole incident was going to be noodle-y. Then the trope is averted in, ahem, glorious fashion when that particular flashback finally kicks in.
• One-Scene Wonder: Lucy Lawless shows up for 2 minutes, gives us our one moment of subtle, restrained acting and then it's back to the show.
• Out-Gambitted: Hel, by Pinky
• Overt Operative: Really, Hel isn't very good at hiding this whole secret agent thing.
• Psycho Lesbian: Subverted with Camero. She's a drugged-out psycho, to be sure, but that's only incidental to the fact that she's a lesbian. Trixie and Hel are also lesbians, but they aren't psycho.
• Right Through Her Pants: The big love scene doesn't actually involve any nudity. It's still really hot, though.
• She's Got Legs: Hel's and Trixie's when they first exit the car. Served up with a healthy side portion of Feet First Introduction.
• Shout-Out:
  • Hel's outfit in prison is a shout out to Rosie the Riveter, the advertising face of women in the World War Two workforce and lesbian icon.
  • The opening and closing credit sequences are themselves shout outs to classic Russ Meyer-style exploitation flicks.
  • Camero's prisoner number is 1138.
  • Many to Xena: Warrior Princess:
    • Cameos of Xena: Warrior Princess actors are endless: Lucy Lawless (Xena), Renée O'Connor (Gabrielle), Kevin Sorbo (Hercules), Michael Hurst (Iolaus), William Gregory Lee (Virgil) and of course the aforementioned Zoe Bell (stunts).
    • In one of the flashbacks, Trixie does Xena's trademark 'flip' jump - straight onto Gage.
    • Kinki's weapon - while not quite like the Chakram itself, is quite reminiscent of it in it's style. Also: the Katana.
• Special Effects Failure: While it may have been intentionally done, all the green screen effects and many of the digital effects in the film are pretty friggin awful.
• Stripperific: Justified in some cases by the fact that some characters are actually strippers, it's played straight for most of the other female characters. At one point Camero rips a nun's robe off herself to reveal a leather thong bikini. She keeps the habit.
• Tattooed Crook: Camero
• The Chick: Trixie is portrayed as this. She's not.
• The Chessmaster: Pinky. To a lesser extent, Hel.
• The Ditz: Trixie, up until The Big Reveal.
• The Handler: Mr. Phoenix.
• The Pornomancer: Camero works her way through a convent, does a contortionist at a circus, and even hits on the girlfriend of the guy she just messily murdered.
• Tourettes Shitcock Syndrome: Hot Wire.
• Troperiffic: This film was lovingly crafted specifically to become a Cult Classic by pinging as many tropes as possible.
• Twist Ending: As it turns out... Trixie is actually Pinky, the notorious Keyser Soze-like crime boss that everyone is afraid of.
• Unwitting Pawn: Camero and Hel, by Pinky.
• Up to Eleven: The script apparently calls for "the greatest Cat Fight ever filmed." It's certainly one of the longest; rivalling the Keith David/Roddy Piper brawl in They Live in duration and brutality.
• Wall-Bang Her: Trixie gets this treatment... by Hel.
• The Vamp: Trixie
• Wet Sari Scene: What do three hot chicks in the middle of the desert do when they're tired of digging in the sand for hidden loot? Use all their water in a gratuitous five-minute splash fight, of course!
• Xanatos Gambit: Pinky's master plan: have Mr. Phoenix send Hel undercover in the women's prison where Camero is rotting after being caught at the convent with the diamonds, so they'll plan to get the location of Gage's secret stash, where the diamonds and nanobot canister Of Doom are... but the actual target is the sword that Gage also stole, that happens to be Pinky's most prized possession.
  • Gambit Pileup: Gage has a hit squad waiting at the nanoweapon sale, so either he gets the diamonds or gets to keep both if the deal goes south. It works out so well that he even gets Pinky's sword in the process. This leads to Pinky's Xanatos Gambit which involves tapping Hel to recruit Camaro and "Trixie" to get the location of Gage's stash, which begets Hel manipulating Camaro into being her dumb muscle.
• X Meets Y: The film is pretty damn upfront about its Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! – meets – Memento (with a garnish of The Usual Suspects) aesthetic.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Subverted ( with Hel) and played straight ( Camero and Deputy Fuchs).