As everyone no doubt knows, this is the follow up to the notorious movie Ilsa She-Wolf of the SS. That flick was a real controversial one, seeing as it was mixing a Nazi concentration camp premise with an extremely exploitative story-line. Despite all of this, it was essentially a very exaggerated movie and really quite hard to take very seriously. In Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks Dyanne Thorne returns as the super-bitch Ilsa. In this one she runs a harem for a sleazy sheik. Or more specifically, she is tasked with turning captured women into his sexual slaves. Of course, this involves much elaborate torture and copious amounts of nudity.If anything, this one is more 'upmarket' than the first film. It has a bigger budget and some decent locations. It's also less controversial subject-wise, although it's still clearly an exploitation movie. The film revolves around sleaze and torture. We have charming things like flesh-eating ants and exploding vaginas after all. So, fear not, this one is still in the same general ball-park as the first. Unfortunately, the sexy Miss Thorne just doesn't get naked enough though, which is somewhat unfortunate and to this movie's detriment. However, we do have a couple of topless female kung-fu experts called Satin and Velvet who rip a poor fool's balls off. And two of the captured slave-girls are played by Russ Meyer regulars Uschi Digard (Supervixens) and Haji (Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!). Both of whom are always a welcome presence in any movie.Despite all of the atrocities, the Ilsa series is basically cartoonish. You cannot take these movies seriously, nor were you intended to. This one, like the others is another combination of gory violence, sleazy erotica and deranged silliness. For my money this one is neither as good as the original, nor Ilsa the Tigress of Siberia. But it's still an entertaining trash-fest.

"Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks" isn't as great as the original, but it's still entertaining.**SPOILERS**Working in the Middle-East, Ilsa, (Dyanne Thorne) works as the keeper for El Sharif, (Jerry Delony) a powerful oil sheik that controls a vast harem. When new members Inga Lindstrom, (Uschi Digard) Nora Edward, (Colleen Brennan) and Alina Cordova, (Haji) arrive to be indoctrinated into the lifestyle and she sets out to do it for them. When US Navy Commander Adam Scott, (Max Thayer) arrives at the camp to help negotiate a treaty for the oil, she takes an immediate personal interest in him and tries to do her best to keep him while also attending to her duties inside his harem. Finally growing restless with his stubbornness and refusal to allow her to keep him around, she decides to stage a coup with the girls and him to take over the palace and exact their revenge.The News: This wasn't that bad, but it's certainly good enough at times. The main issue with this one is that this one is just as good as the original in the sleaze department when it tries to. There's a generous helping of nudity in here, delivered with plenty of opportunities to show some really nice moments. There's the usual inspection of all the slaves sequence here, where they spend the time going over every inch of their body and giving clear looks at everything on display to their training sequences for the harem, which include sexual favors, performances and more, all done with emphasis on the sleaze and nudity presented in the situation. Usually reserved for the dirtier side, yet there's a matter of doing the scenes for their best at giving off a great, dirty feel while also doing it's best to feel romantic and sensuous as well. These work from the film's several sex scenes or massages that occur throughout. There's even some from the various tortures inflicted in here, which are suitably disgusting without being too graphic. The biggest one, the ants over the legs while gnawing away on the flesh is a really gruesome sight and really does a lot of good for the brutality stakes with tons of closeups of the creatures crawling all over the skin and the wounds that occur from the bites. It's all wonderfully exploitative and works wonders for the film. There's also the wonderfully cruel forms of torture dished out along the way, including the rebel who gets set on fire in a spectacular scene that's the best moment in the film by a large majority, a thief has their hand amputated in full view of everyone at a party and an incredibly squirm-inducing one with rats-in-a-cage. There's a couple other great parts to this, mainly the really fun action scenes at the end. This one gets a little more thrilling and exciting than the previous one, which is a great feat in that it gets one over on the original, and the huge body count is a lot of fun. There's a few problems with it, though, mainly in the fact that it doesn't really feel as dirty as the first one. It's a lot more toned down in the sleaze, with the violence being quite removed from where it was, there's a lot less amount of nudity than before despite it feeling like there's a lot, and the sleaze amounts are much lower, leaving very little in the way of the original. The only other problem to be had with this one is the more relaxed pace, with a lot more scenes that appear thrown in for the sole purpose of expanding the film out. The conversations about what to do with the harem girls didn't need to be done so often, as often-times it was just for a couple quick lines with no progression made in the time, and it sort of makes the middle drag a little bit. These, though, are minor problems and don't distract enough to ruin this one completely.The Final Verdict: Not as good or as sleazy as the original, but it's still enough to make it a watchable entry in the exploitation cannon. Give it a shot if you liked the first one, are interested in the genre or have a deep appreciation for these kinds of films, but if you weren't a fan of the first heed caution.Rated R: Full Nudity, Graphic Violence, some mild sex scenes and some Language

I would definitely recommend this movie to any fans of 70's 'B' movie sleaze. Director Don Edmonds manages to pack copious amounts depravity, sex & violence into this flick, with Dyanne Thorne camping it up as the evil Ilsa. Actually, she isn't as evil as she was in the other Ilsa films. but she still manages to hand out several doses of deranged torture on her unfortunate prisoners. The film also features perhaps one of the most brutal film fights ever, when a disobedient male guard is forced to fight Ilsa's thong wearing female personal bodyguards !. I really enjoyed watching this trash - YES it is TRASH, but it KNOWS it's trash & didn't cost millions like Charlies Angels!. Now everyone has come across DVD commentary tracks which are along the lines of 'Yeah I remember that, yeah that was fun etc', but this one actually makes the film even more enjoyable. Thorne & Edmonds give a highly entertaining account of the movie, explaining why many of the performances were so wooden and how low the budget for the movie was. It makes one realise that many of our 'respected' actors would look just as bad as the cast of this movie if they were only allowed one take because the film makers only had a limited amount of film stock!. Not for the squeamish or lovers of 'quality' cinema, but great fun for sleaze addicts!.

Yeah, this first installment of the notorious Ilsa-series is a real goody! It is not as disturbing as "She Wolf" or "The Wicked Warden", but also not as campy as "Tigress" was! Fans of traditional adventure flicks might love it, too. The only difference is, that "Harem Keeper" features much more sex´n violence than you may find in popcorn movies à la "Indiana Jones" and friends..! If you´re a fan of the series you know what´s awaiting you! If not, prepare for a bundled load of sleazy erotic, some bizarre torture and lots of comic-like brutality! Once more Dyanne Thorne is over the top (A pity that she doesn´t take off her clothes more often..!), but also her two African helpers named "Satin" and "Velvet" are put on a show very well! And a film where Swedish supermodel Uschi Digard is casted can´t be that worse..! Exploitation cinema at its best!!!