Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

just watch it!

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

I imagine the sole reason for most people to want to see this movie is for the screen debut of 50s cinema sex goddess Jayne Mansfield. However, the film itself stands up reasonably well after fifty years.The plot, as you are probably already aware, concerns the hunt for the killer of a Hollywood actress, murdered after she leaves a bar. An off-duty cop is in the frame as the killer and sets out to track down the real culprit.This movie was obviously done on the cheap but has a gritty edge to it and more than enough action and suspense to fill its meagre running time. Shot entirely at night the film has an oppressive feel and has good performances from all concerned. Jayne Mansfield, in her film debut, is very impressive as a slutty broad and performs well without her trademark squeal. Although obviously very attractive she isn't at all glamorous here and acts very well. For anyone in doubt of her abilities then Female Jungle proves that she definitely had something.Cheap, short and in the long term, forgettable, this is still an entertaining way to spend an hour. Don't break your neck to see it but if the opportunity arises, don't pass it by.

Like countless young actors today, in 1954 a 21-year old named Jayne Mansfield made her professional motion picture debut in an ultra low-budget indie. To be sure, Mansfield remains the primary reason for taking a serious look at FEMALE JUNGLE today -- as it showcases a yet-unformed actress with obvious beauty and a naturalistic quality and simple commitment that -- in the bulk of her film work post-the Marilyn Monroe-caricature she gleefully played in 1957's WILL SUCCESS SPOIL ROCK HUNTER? -- the lady, sadly, never truly regained.Shot in 10 days under the working title HANGOVER, this 70-minute B&W movie was a labor of love (and ego?) for its writer/producer/star Burt Kaiser. Plotted as a noir-ish little caper involving the murder of a glamorous movie starlet -- mysteriously strangled in the street outside a dive bar in downtown LA -- keeps the lives of three men in an all-night turmoil. Under Bruno Ve Sota's macho direction, these include actor Lawrence Tierney being pensively murky as the blackout-drunken, off-duty cop; B-horror movie king John Carradine distinguishing the film with his usual picking-up-a-paycheck performance, while sprinkling in a flavor of sophisticated menace; and Kaiser as a brooding hard- luck street artist, looking like an un-shaven Johnny Depp doing an imitation of Marlon Brando. Playing Kaiser's anything-for-the-guy wife is Kathleen Crowley, whose coolly contained beauty reminded me a another '50s brunette, Jean Peters. Add to the mix a call-girl named "Candy Price," and you've got a movie "Introducing Jayne Mansfield."With its clunky dialogue and choppy narrative, nowadays, FEMALE JUNGLE plays like of a second-rate episode of TV's HOMICIDE. Still, it's an energetic effort from all involved, and the acting is pretty damn good. Production values, especially the film's lighting and editing, are haphazard, though the jazzy soundtrack keeps the melodrama churning in a fun mid-50s way.As for Mansfield, like I said, it's an impressive debut. Honestly. She's only got three substantial scenes. In keeping with these kinds of noir-yarns, the guys take most of the screen time. Still, Mansfield makes the most of hers, including a serious smooch session with the sexy Kaiser. In fact, their longest scene has a back & forth that goes something like this: line of dialogue. KISS. line. KISS. line. KISS. KISS. little line. KISS, etc. Long, wet & sloppy, Jayne & Burt go for it! And with the guy's dark, edgy handsomeness, well... it probably makes for the most erotic scene in all of Mansfield's movies. Oddly, for an actress who made her name as a "Sex Symbol," Mansfield has surprisingly few love-making scenes on her resume. FEMALE JUNGLE is one of the few. And it's a hot one.Finally, although she would come to typify the bouncy dumb blonde persona onward from '56's THE GIRL CAN'T HELP IT and the aforementioned ROCK HUNTER, I find Mansfield's earlier work here (not to mention her subtle performance in Paul Wendkos's under-rated '55 noir THE BURGLAR) has an organic honesty that would get squashed in the bulk of her later work. Don't get me wrong, I dig the daffy yet mannered high-pitched squeals, goo-goo popping eyes and bosom-thrusting exhibitionism that Jayne Mansfield would become famous for, but... did they mask her true abilities? FEMALE JUNGLE makes it apparent: The actress had more to offer than met the eye.

There's a persuasive argument to be mounted that the end of the so-called Golden Age of Hollywood movie-making can be ascribed not to the studios' divestiture of its theater chains but to the explosion, in the motorized society of the 1950s, of drive-in theaters, where the main attraction was not on the screen. Up to that point, even the lowliest second feature was apt to show at least a modicum of craft and plausibility. The exploitation movies changed all that, ushering in an era when just about anything goes – or, often, nothing.American International Pictures was the outfit that pioneered fodder for the teenage popcorn-and-petting trade. In 1956, it released one of its few features that might be considered even marginally noir – Female Jungle (also called The Hangover). Neither title quite fits, though the second has a bit more claim to legitimacy than the first, which was simply a ploy to pack 'em in.After the gala premiere of her debut film, a starlet leaves a seedy bar and meets her quietus at the hands of a strangler. For the next hour or so, Lawrence Tierney, John Carradine, Jane Mansfield and half a dozen other characters go racketing around through the night on a series of wild-goose chases. Tierney plays an off-duty policeman whose long evening bending his elbow resulted in a blackout; he thinks he might have been the killer. Carradine plays a gossip columnist whose helped the dead starlet's career, only to be jilted. Mansfield (in her screen debut) seems to be playing a call-girl who's in love with an out-of-work caricaturist whose wife might be the next victim of….All that said, Female Jungle remains watchable, if barely. It was AIP's policy to engage a few actors on the way up and a few more on the way down, filling up the rest of the slots with whoever was handy (both the producer and director have parts in the movie). But Tierney, by this time seriously on the skids and persona-non-grata in the major studios, exudes some of his rough magic while Carradine, looking particularly suave, gives it his old-trouper's all. And Mansfield, of course, has her own morbid fascination. There's a peculiar allure to some of this late-50s sleaze; if you're into it, this is the movie for you.

Lawrence Tierney was given numerous low-life/tough-guy roles throughout the 40's in such noirs as BORN TO KILL (1947) and THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE (1948), until he gained himself a bad name in Hollywood for his constant bar-brawls and arrests. The Tierney architype was resurected in the 50's when minor studios decided to milk the one-time noir icon for what he was worth. His only 50's come-back films I know of are THE HOODLUM (1951-United Artists) and THE FEMALE JUNGLE (1956-ARC), directed by the very under-rated Bruno VeSota right after DAUGHTER OF HORROR.Lawrence plays a bum alcoholic detective who investigates in the murder of an actress committed outside the same bar he was drinking in. The plot unfolds itself from flashbacks. Producer, Burt Kaiser plays an alcoholic and unemployed artist, married to waitress, Kathleen Crowley. Kaiser is asked one night by a mysterious gossip columnist (the wonderfully sinister John Carradine, looking suave as ever in white tie and tails) to have his characature painted. Kaiser and Tierney both have affairs with Candy, a deliciously slutty bombshell (Jayne Mansfield, looking stunning in her film debut). Other suspects include George, the black janitor, James Kodl providing some intentional laughs as Joe, the bar owner and Cornelius Keefe (billed as Jack Hill!) as the Chief.During World War 2, anyone who went to the movies had no choice but to pay money and view low-budget black-and-white quickies beacuse of the restrictions. Bottom-of-the-barrel studios like PRC and Monogram were in their element turning 'em out faster than they ever did before. This also gave film noir (considered lowbrow entertainment back then) an opportunity to be shown to wider audiences. The 50's saw just about every cinema-goer heading for the 70mm CinemaScope epics and big-name blockbusters leaving all other kinds of films to be viewed by nonexistent crowds at either art-house or drive-in theatres. It also saw the very last of the film noir echoeing it's way through the minor studio system. FEMALE JUNGLE, a great noir by many standards, was sold to Sam Arkoff and James H. Nicholson for ARC (pre-AIP) in 1956 and was dumped on a drive-in double-bill with OKLAHOMA WOMAN, a western directed by Roger Corman! I still don't think that FEMALE JUNGLE has got the appreciation it deserves. It is a superior film noir full of interesting low-life characters and dimly lit side-streets which all of us noir-lovers crave for in a film.In an interview, Jayne Mansfield said that FEMALE JUNGLE "was filmed in two weeks and led to nothing". She was paid $150 for starring and then returned to her job as a popcorn-girl in a cinema before returning to the screen again in WILL SUCCESS SPOIL ROCK HUNTER? Lawrence Tierney wound up driving a taxi cab in Central Park before being resurected again (!) to play his tough-guy role in John Huston's PRIZZI'S HONOR (1985) and again in Tarantino's RESERVOIR DOGS (1993). Bruno VeSota later directed THE BRAIN EATERS (1958) and INVASION OF THE STAR CREATURES (1962), starred in numerous drive-in features throughout the late-50's and 60's (TEENAGE DOLL, A BUCKET OF BLOOD, THE CHOPPERS...) before dying of a heart attack in 1976 aged 54.