Blu-ray Review – Death Ride to Osaka

After suffering through a strong of box office disappointments, director Jonathan Kaplan took refuge in television movies, spending the early 1980s managing a handful of network offerings for mass audiences. 1983's "Death Ride to Osaka" (a.k.a. "Girls of the White Orchid") is perhaps the most aggressive of the bunch, with Kaplan in charge of providing exploitation fare for NBC, creating a cautionary tale about human trafficking that's careful to linger on violence and uneasy sexuality. "Death Ride to Osaka" isn't hard-hitting stuff, but Kaplan finds a certain level of potency with the rougher edges of the teleplay (credited to Carole and Michael Raschella), also exploring cultural confusion during the run time, aiming to deliver something unsettling while still remaining an accessible night of T.V. for adult audiences. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com