Mach mich nicht an!

This is now my fourth consecutive review of a cheerleader movie following The Cheerleaders, The Swinging Cheerleaders, and Revenge of the Cheerleaders. It's also the third in a row of a movie that features one Cheryl "Rainbeaux" Smith. She plays Roxanne here (though I don't remember her name ever being called in the film) and unlike the last two, she's not starring, only supporting or maybe "a glorified cameo" would be more like it since her appearances don't really have to do with the main action. The main cheerleaders featured here are Sally (Lisa Reeves) and Laurie (Jennifer Ashley). Sally is the blonde one who was once involved with Duane (Bill Adler) but then falls for one football player named Johnnie (Robert Carradine in a role much different from his later familiar one in Revenge of the Nerds!). Laurie is the brunette one who eventually warms to fellow pigskin player Jesse (Michael Mullins). Jessie himself previously liked to fool around as he does with Roxanne and a car hop girl named Sue Ann (Susan Player) before getting involved with Laurie. Unlike the other cheerleader movies I previously reviewed, the sex-while there-isn't emphasized too much. In fact, while The Cheerleaders was a sex farce through and through, The Swinging Cheerleaders went back and forth between comedy and drama, and Revenge of the Cheerleaders was a contrived chaotic mess, The Pom Pom Girls seemed more life-like in presenting the teen hijinks and seeing how some friendships and relationships develop overtime despite some still contrived moments like the football game devolving into a free-for-all fight! And, yes, some scenes do borrow from some classic movies like the "chicken run" that does have a character mention James Dean and his Rebel Without a Cause. My favorite was a food fight scene that has Carradine and Adler taking their time in Laurel-and-Hardy slow burn-like fashion. Oh, and the '70s music soundtrack sounds just like the kind of songs one would hear on AM radio in those days. It should be noted that Crown International Pictures-perhaps one of the most successful of the drive-in distributors-was responsible for this and they always made many quite enjoyable B-type movies of this genre like Malibu Beach (which also featured Susan Player) and The Van (which also featured Bill Adler). Oh, and the director of this may surprise you if you're more familiar with his suspense movies like The Stepfather or Sleeping with the Enemy: Joseph Ruben! He also co-wrote it. Actually, the ending scene may clue you in of his talents there. Anyway, I really enjoyed The Pom Pom Girls so, yeah, that's a recommendation.

It's hard to know what to make of The Pom Pom Girls. Though the producers of this flick clearly knew what they were doing when they cooked up that moniker to lure in their target young male audience, the title has very little to do with the movie they actually made. There are indeed cheerleaders in this film, but most of them are essentially used for set dressing while the bulk of the proceedings fixate upon the shenanigans carried out by two of the football players they're on hand to cheer for. Obviously crafted on a grindhouse budget and with that mindset, The Pom Pom Girls further confounds expectations by eschewing the anticipated exploitation elements to devote most of its run-time to a series of tepid vignettes that aren't connected with any real story to speak of, then abruptly swerving into a fairly straight teen drama in the the third act (reportedly, 80 seconds of nudity and language were excised from the original R-rated cut to earn the film a wider PG release, which is the version that most commonly circulates now). The end result is a movie that is roughly half decent and half pointless, which makes delivering a firm recommendation somewhat of a challenge.

The centerpieces of the action here are Johnny and Jesse, two best friends gearing up for their upcoming high school gridiron season. They spend most of this caper wandering from one misadventure to the next with little rhyme or reason: driving around, eating burgers at the local hangout, making out with various girls, defacing the cars at their rival school, having food fights, urinating out of their classroom windows, then stealing a fire truck and nearly murdering the town Sheriff with it (you know, normal teenage stuff). Though presented in a light-hearted way, their antics are more hm-amusing than sincerely ha-ha-humorous, which leaves the comedy quotient here severely lacking. The tenor of the film shifts for the better when the duo finally couples up with Laurie and Sally, the main Pom Pom Girls they've been casually chasing from the start. Suddenly, actual storylines begin taking shape: Johnny contends with the increasingly volatile machinations of his gal's jealous ex-boyfriend, as Jesse struggles to kick his habit of bedding a bevy of lasses in the back of his van and commit to just one while also butting heads with the team's despotic coach. From this point forward, PPG remains a far cry from the nuanced character studies in Dazed And Confused, but the narrative at least finds some sense of purpose and the last 30 minutes are a vast improvement because of it.

It's interesting to see a pre-Revenge Of The Nerds Robert Carradine tackle the leading man role, particularly because his Johnny is pretty much the same soon-to-be iconic goofball minus the glasses and few braincells. Only here, that mien results in him being a popular football player who's impressively successful with the ladies (who knew a change of clothes and a pair of spectacles could make a young man's social fortunes plummet so drastically?). TV cop show stalwart Michael Mullins does a capable job of bringing Jesse to life, while the spotlit Jennifer Ashley and Lisa Reeves are both attractive and likeable enough to distinguish themselves as the clear stand-outs among their fellow Pom Poms.

However, the most engrossing elements in this effort are an accidental product of its era. This is a thoroughly '70s film, and since it's singularly focused on youth culture a lot of the best aspects of that decade play prominent roles. The small town where the action takes place is straight out of a simpler time, while notable features like the bustling carhop, roads with no traffic, and wide open plots of waterfront sand without another beachgoer in sight offer glimpses of a world which sadly does not exist anymore. The classic cars and vintage clothes are all authentic in a way that no modern period piece could ever faithfully duplicate, and even without the benefit of a purse large enough to license popular contemporary songs for the soundtrack, all of the needfully obscure music used in the film sets the tone very well.

In the end, you can't sincerely fault The Pom Pom Girls for not being what it appears to be, since what it really is has more than enough charms to justify the 85-minutes you'll spend with it. If you're so inclined, give it a look for the beautiful girls, good tunes, and a vivid snapshot of high school in the 1970's. Anyone likely to be interested in a B-grade relic like this has undoubtedly invested much more energy for a much more meager payoff than that.

This is a rare film in that it is a 1970's teen movie that seems to have been genuinely aimed at 1970's teens (rather than drooling adult perverts). The so-called "teen sexploitation" genre would become really big in the early 1980's era of "Porky's" and "Fast Times at Ridgemont", and is still going strong today even in these censorial times. Personally though, the 80's films remind me too much of my own adolescence, and I prefer to leave the modern-day teen films to modern-day teens, but I just can't get enough of the 70's teen films though. Unfortunately, while many of these films are nominally ABOUT 70's teens, very few seem to actually be made FOR 70's teens. Take, for instance, "The Cheerleaders", the movie that started off the craze for sexy and sex-crazed high school and collegiate cheerleaders, which may be considered a classic by some, but can hardly be considered even a remotely realistic portrayal of teenage life in 70's America. The same can be said with the rest of the cheerleader films (which eventually reached their logical culmination in the hardcore classic "Debbie Does Dallas").

This film is different, however, in that it seems to be trying to capture the anarchic free spirit of the era more than just being an excuse to salivate over naked nubile bodies. It actually resembles "Dazed and Confused" (minus, of course, the self-conscious nostalgia) more than "The Cheerleaders". Of course, it's not all that realistic (the kids at one point steal a fire truck, which I think even in the 70's would have more likely been considered a serious felony than hilarious teen hijinks), and there IS some sex and nudity (naturally, with the ever-exploitable Cheryl "Rainbeaux" Smith in the cast).

There's no point in relating the plot because there really isn't one in these kind of movies--just a lot of random partying, sex, and wacky teen hijinks). The cast is pretty interesting. Besides Smith, there's Robert Carradine, the youngest Carradine brother, who was also in the minor cult film "Massacre at Central High" with Smith and the underrated "TAG:The Assassination Game", but is, of course, most famous for "Revenge of the Nerds". There's also Jennifer Ashley, a minor but ubiquitous drive-in queen, who even showed up in Mexican exploitation films like Rene Cardona Jr.'s sex and shark epic "Tintorera", and the luscious Susan Player who appeared in both American ("Malibu Beach") and European ("Las Adolescentes") exploitation fare. The director, Joseph Ruben, meanwhile would go on to direct "The Stepfather", one of the most cleverly subversive horror films of the Reagan era. This isn't quite as good as any of these aforementioned films (well, I guess it's better that "Tintotera"), but it's certainly worth seeing.

"American Graffiti" styled high school comedy-drama concerns a couple of knockabout gridion players (Carradine and Mullins) wooing the affections of a pair of lusty young cheerleaders (Ashley and Reeves), much to the chagrin of Reeve's jilted ex-boyfriend (Adler) who eventually challenges Carradine to a game of chicken (a la Harrison Ford). In between, there's plenty of sex, misdemeanors and practical joking to make up the school day.

Seemingly endless array of practical jokes is punctuated by heavy-petting with Susie Player getting the most exposure as the hamburger joint waitress, while the pretty Jennifer Ashley (who had a relatively brief but memorable filmography in the mid-70's through early-80's) has her moment or two sans blouse. She's given little else to do, and that's no different to the rest of the cast in a film that contains very little dialogue. Bill Adler is an interesting specimen, playing a tough-talking cuckold whose bravado is only skin deep. He at least manages to evoke some sympathy whereas Carradine simply comes off looking like an arrogant twerp. Film buffs might also recognise Rainbeaux Smith in a frivolous minor role as one of the cheerleaders.

Vintage cars with enhanced mufflers, obscure mid-70's soundtrack, over-the-top food fights and a couple of genuine laughs (Mullins is caught leaving Ashley's house the morning after by her dad who invites him back inside for breakfast, and, the cheerleader auditions) liven proceedings, but the pace is terminal and the content lacking. Vaguely nostalgic, but essentially it's a show about nothing.

You've seen it all before and several times since, the atypical teeny-bop sex romp, that's less filling... but, tastes great. Recently, I was in one of those "Hey, I wanna see some Bobby Carradine action, circa '76" moods... so, I rented this, and actually enjoyed it.

Since 1976 was such a damned good year, I like to re-live it, as much as possible, and this film along with a headliner of "THE BOY IN THE PLASTIC BUBBLE" (the best "boy with immune deficiency syndrome and raging-hormones-to-boot" movie-of-the-week, ever), fit the bill, perfectly.

Like I said, I dug it. A pleasant little curiousity from an era when the drive-in was in full swing. The film's not great, mind you, but if you are a fan of Robert Carradine, you will enjoy seeing him in one of his first leading roles. Joseph Ruben (who also made "JOYRIDE" with Carradine, the next year for American-International), wrote and directed this film, years before he tread cult status with "DREAMSCAPE", or later fame with films like "SLEEPING WITH THE ENEMY". James Gammon, who is best recognized from his role as the coach in the "MAJOR LEAGUE" films, appears here as the high school football coach.

I will say this... the "lunchbreak duel" sequence is brilliant. A great piece of comedy.

All around, this is great late nite fare... it did the trick for me! And, when you're done with this, pop in "THE SENIORS" with Dennis Quaid and Priscilla Barnes, for even more "bang for your buck"... or, you can save a buck, by getting to know me, becoming my close personal friend, and rubbing me the right way, until I eventually cave in and let you borrow my copy! This could take anywhere from 2-94 weeks for hand-written confirmation, of course. Just mull it over, a bit.

That's all for now, kids.

Reporting from my fingertips... -Nathan.