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The Centerfold Girls
[Dark Sky Films]
1974; color
Directed by John Peyser
Starring: Tiffany Bolling, Aldo Ray, Ray Danton, Francine York, Jennifer Ashley, Jaime Lyn Bauer & Andrew Prine
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Just to prove we can't always judge a book by it's cover - or, more accurately, a movie by it's title - we have The Centerfold Girls. A movie, based solely on the title, I would have guessed would be a late '70s softcore sex flick, possibly produced by Roger Corman. Meaning the kind of movie that's essentially just a not so thinly veiled excuse to parade a lot of twenty-something chicks who don't own bras in front of the camera. Instead this is an early entry into the slasher / let's violently kill random women and blame their loose morals category; and a not so thinly veiled excuse to parade a lot of twenty-something chicks who don't wear bras in front of the camera. But at least it's got a plot. The Centerfold Girls stars Andrew Prine (last seen on the Buffet as Simon of Simon, King Of The Witches) as a dirty magazine obsessed serial killing stalker preying on, obviously, women who pose nude for dirty magazines. (Bachelor magazine to be exact. And yes, there was actually a men's magazine with that name. Although the issues we have are from the late '50s / early '60s and are quite innocent as far as dirty magazines go.) As an odd quirk, he also takes a single shoe from each of his victims. The female ones at least, or at least the ones he thinks are centerfold models. (He does make at least one mistake, both in the killing and shoe stealing; and a couple of dudes get killed along the way thanks to being in the wrong place at the wrong time.) I love a good '70s vintage shoe myself - or, for wearing purposes, pair of shoes; truthfully though, only one of the pairs was worth stealing, the orange velvet platforms courtesy the accidentally killed blond in the third "scene." But I digress. Particularly since that detail has so little to do with the story I am kind of confused as to why they bothered to write it in. (Seriously, he could have taken pretty much anything as a token and pretty much anything would have been just as relevant / irrelevant.) I have to say I wasn't expecting much from this film. Although I don't think I'll be rewatching it regularly, sitting through it was nowhere near as painful as I thought it would be. (How's that for a back handed compliment?!) I was expecting it to be completely meritless, misogynistic and possibly bloody and gross but it was only slightly bloody, not gross and certainly no more misogynistic than any other movie of it's ilk. Plus, you know, when your plot involves a man who is driven to murder women out of a sense of sexual shame the misogyny is kind of built in. Also included in this package is a brief but worth watching featurette.
—Bunny
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