Playgirl Killer

This ultra-cheap psycho-thriller (and I use the word 'thriller' very loosely here) is the kind of flick that deserves a place on a lot of 'worst movies' list, and yet it's kind of fun to watch bad films like this that fail hopelessly to achieve even a degree of the quality to which they aspire.

Sixties B-movie icon William Kerwin plays Bill, a tortured artist with a brutal way of dealing with his fidgety models. We first meet Bill sketching a hot chick on a rock who keeps tossing her hair as he's trying to sketch her. He grabs a handy spear gun and shoots her. Unluckily for Bill, he's spotted by a passer-by and is now on the run for his life. He gets a job with Arlene (Jean Christopher), a rich young woman, as a handyman at the house in which she is staying alone. Now, a few things about Arlene: Firstly, we learn early on that she is something of a tease. We see her tying Neil Sedaka in knots (yeah, **that** Neil Sedaka: I don't know what he's doing here either – and neither, I reckon, does he) and upsetting her sister by posing in her bikini by the pool and getting Sedaka to rub suntan lotion into her back. Then she stages an impromptu striptease at her sister's party before sneaking into Sedaka's bedroom to give him a warm and generous sending off present. Arlene is real bad news; she glides around that big house in a perpetual state of sensuous ecstasy, sipping wine in her nightie and swimming in the nude. She also has a great body. In fact every woman in the film has a great body. That's the selling point, you see: watching hot chicks get iced (literally). Anyway, because of these man-eating habits of Arlene's we don't really get that concerned when Bill starts stalking her after watching her indulging in a bit of skinny-dipping.

It takes director Erick Santamaria forever to set up Arlene's murder – at least half the movie – but once Bill has done her in he sets off at a frenetic pace, killing every shapely female who has the misfortune to pass his way. Strangely, the pace of the movie still crawls along and, with Arlene and her bikinis out of the way, there often isn't anything happening on the screen to keep us even remotely interested. Well, that's not quite true, because there's always the comedy-editing job to keep us amused. I mean background walls change colour in this film – it's as if they ran out of film so inserted a shot from a different scene to fill the gaps. The noisy soundtrack is also a constant irritation, and the plot has more holes than a lump of Swiss cheese. After all that, there's quite a neat twist ending, but sadly Santamaria, whose only effort this film was, even manages to mess up this last chance of at least partially redeeming himself.

As I said, this film is so relentlessly cheesy it's sort of fun – but only if you're a lover of bad movies that are trying to be good

In the awards category of 'most cuckoo killers of all times', this film's anti-hero Bill is a strong contender for the win! Bill, last name unknown, is an artist who needs models to paint a vision that occurred to him in a dream. Finding these models isn't an issue, because for some strange reason gorgeous women throw themselves at Bill's feet, but they are terribly unprofessional and they...won't...sit...still! So Bill goes berserk and butchers them, but luckily he's also creative and persistent enough to find a solution to use their corpses.

"Playgirl Killer" looks and feels a lot like a Hershell Gordon Lewis movie, but without the extreme gore. That's largely because lead actor William Kerwin is a HG. Lewis' regular, but also and simply because it's an absurd and low-keyed B-movie story without continuity or tension, and with a lot of amateurish performances. Plus, it's a typical product of the sixties; meaning there's irritating and useless dancing footage. Perhaps the most remarkable gimmick is that it stars Neil Sedaka in his first and only real acting role. Sedaka is the singer of such crooner hits like "Oh Carol!", "Calendar Girl" and "Breaking up is hard to do". His role here, as Bob, requires him to - surprise - sing a song during a pool party.

We launch our story with the harpoon murder of a zaftig young lady, casually snuffed for failing to sit still while posing for the killer's artistic doodles. We're off to a good start. We next find our psychotic doodlebug in the employ of a well-to-do sexpot(we know she's a cheap little whore because her tits are hiked to her chin and she has the same on-screen saxophone leitmotif as "Ginger" from GILLIGAN'S ISLAND). Not surprisingly, she's killed as well, as is the next girl, and the next, etcetera...all for refusing to stay still while the killer is sketching them. The psychoanalytical diagnosis for the killer's insatiable lustmord is hilariously implausible, and thus keeps perfect step with the film's immersive kitch appeal.

PLAYGIRL KILLER is a jovially mean-spirited exercise in full-throttle sexism...a lovable paragon of 60s schlock splendor which could be regarded as Canada's answer to H. G. Lewis' iconic COLOR ME BLOOD RED(1965). The film's technical parts-and-parcels are expectedly less-than, though sparks of amateur enthusiasm are occasionally evident. A very young and doughy Neil Sedaka is on-hand for a trivial "star-power" guest spot, obviously inclusive of a brief musical repose.

A delectably gauche, consistently watchable flick with a good sense of humor about itself, PLAYGIRL KILLER is semi-essential vintage sleaze.

6/10.

This film is a really sick piece of work. The artist kills women just because they won't stay perfectly still for him and you feel no sympathy for any of them as most of them either come off as nymphos or just have bad attitudes. Only the third victim, the girl who answers an ad for a boarder, seems like a nice girl. Unfortunately, she is killed before you really get to know her. Also, just before the girl is killed she is conveniently taking off her clothes and is only in her bra and panties when she is killed.

It seems like the director had a real hatred for women and was just interested in showing them in various states of undress. No wonder people say that this is one of the worst films ever made and that the only time that it was ever shown was late at night when the kiddies were asleep.

This movie is quite reminiscent of the 60's b-films by either Roger Corman or Hershell Gordon Lewis. All the women look like playboy models, it has characters come in and out of the story needlessly and for little reason other than the fact that they could only hire their "star" (in this case Neil Sedaka) for a day or two. There's the weird-O-rama soundtrack from Hell consisting of lots of single sustained organ notes, and lots of neat location shots of characters running around to and from each other. I'm quite partial to this film since it was made in Montreal and I recognize many of the sites where it was made even after almost 35 years. There is no way to reccomend this other than saying that if you like the works of either H.G. Lewis or Roger Corman you'll want to add it to your collection. Otherwise you'll find the somewhat sadistic storyline, grindingly slow style and cardboard characters who talk like Edgar Allan Poe wrote their lines quite anachronistic and dull compared to todays films.