EDITOR’S NOTE: Girls of the White Orchid was on the CBS Late Movie on April 24 and July 28, 1987 as Death Ride to Osaka.
This was based on a report by ABC’s 20/20 about women who go to Japan to work as entertainers but end up becoming sex workers for the Yakuza. NBC wanted producer Leonard Hill to use Melinda Culea from The A-Team, but he wanted Jennifer Jason Leigh. He did use two actors who were currently on NBC shows, Ann Jillian (who was on Jennifer Slept Here at the time this was made) and Thomas Byrd (who was on the show Boone).
Director Jonathan Kaplan started his directing career making New World movies like Night Call Nurses and The Student Nurses, and later made more socially acceptable stuff like The Accused. This sits in the middle of it all, blending exploitation and art into a TV movie.
Jennifer Jason Lee plays Carol Heath, a waitress who came to Japan to be a new wave singer and, well, you can imagine how that worked out. Ann Jillian plays Marilyn, who made the same journey years ago and stuck around, and Carolyn Seymour plays Madame Mori, the woman who runs the hostess bar. Yes, this is pretty much a Mr. Mom reunion with those two actresses. Plus, Mako and Soon-Tek Oh show up. They take Carol’s passport, the U.S. embassy refuses to help and perhaps only her American ex-boyfriend Don (Thomas Byrd) can save her.
Brad Fiedel did a pretty fun synth score for this, and wow, Steve Miller’s “Abracadabra” pops up, and you forget this was a TV movie. You know, unless you watched the international cut of this, which has a few moments of nudity and sex. The Tubi edition has them, as does the Fun City Edition’s Primetime Panic box set.
You can watch this on Tubi.
