Cover Girl Models

This movie is quite simply horrible.

I only watched it because Mary Woronov was in it. Barely in it.

It's mostly shot overseas -- Singapore. No on can act and the story is just too silly to keep your interest.

Besides Mary, there is another woman, whose name I can't place but whose face is familiar from Grind house flicks of the 70's.

Unfortunately this movie isnt really grindhouse by any standard. It's just a dull exercise in bad acting, bad directing and bad writing.

I'm not familiar with the director but apparently, based on some other reviews, he has a history of making slow tiresome movies.

"They're fast. They're beautiful. They're deadly. They have to be....to survive". That's the tagline of "Cover Girl Models" on my VHS cover, and based on that and on the names of Cirio H. Santiago and Pat Anderson (who kicked a lot of butt the same year in the same director's "T.N.T Jackson"), I was expecting an action film with tough girls. Disappointingly, there is very little action in this movie and nearly all of it is done by men (yawn). In truth, nothing much happens throughout the film, there are endless filler sequences, the main plot is murky, the various subplots are introduced and then dropped, and even the shootout climax is weak. The girls are infectiously cute and occasionally nude, but neither them nor the exotic locations (Hong Kong and Singapore) can stop the 70-minute running time from feeling more like 2 hours! (*)

Before Roger and wife Julie Corman's full-fledged New World production SUMMER SCHOOL TEACHERS, tall blonde beauty Pat Anderson and intense brunette Rhonda Hopkins played COVER GIRL MODELS...

Which wasn't made but distributed by Corman, who sent many production companies (including his own) to the Philippines for low-budget exploitation ranging from female prison flicks to what COVER GIRL MODELS quickly shapes into...

A kind of James Bond flick with chicks in the lead, and not really a spoof since the microfilm plot involving villain Vic Diaz vs helpful karate hero Tony Ferrer can get dangerous while the most lightweight aspect's in Corman regular Tara Strohmeier (quickly replacing the diva-like Hopkins): beginning as a naive, endearingly sweet and clumsy model's assistant before becoming one herself, attached to handsome photographer (and her TRUCK TURNER co-star) John Kramer...

Yet the real scene-stealer's future spunky TV-actress Lindsay Bloom (who'd play Stacy Keach as Mike Hammer's secretary Velda), not fitting as much as either Pat Anderson or Tara, both usually game for lots of Corman nudity...

During the central overseas photo-shoot and fashion show, Bloom's quirky peroxide-blonde keeps trying to land a role for a fat-cat producer, who said models cannot be actresses, a kind of in-joke since she's particularly natural and effective: accidentally going undercover before winding up a hostage to gun-wielding thugs...

Making COVER GIRL MODELS both a three-women Corman style sexy-adventure (actually produced/directed by Cirio H. Santiago) and a crime flick exploitation hybrid, that, backed by a groovy xylophone lounge-jazz-score, works much better than intended or expected.

This film is classed as a thriller; it is the story of three young fashion models away on location in Hong Kong, who somehow become mixed up in an international espionage ring. Apart from being difficult to follow, this story was absolute punk and hopefully the scriptwriter involved was subsequently advised to take an early retirement. Nevertheless the film features some delightful vacation scenery which brought back memories of holidays I would not want to forget, as well as the group of charming models who provide various fashion shows of their very attractive summer outfits. What more should one expect? The cinematography was generally fully adequate, and at this level there was very little to criticise. I would not want to keep watching it, but I can enjoy an occasional re-run with complete equanimity. However, the primary reason why my copy of this film occupies an important place in my collection of DVD and VCD disks, is its unusually short running time (73 min.). I am often glad to have a few short films that run for not much more than an hour available for the entertainment of the children of guests who cannot stay very much longer than this. Since most home videos were originally produced as films intended for showing in movie houses, most tend to run for 90 min. or more, and very few meet my 75 minute requirement. Because Centrefold Models helps to fill this important gap I am rating it more highly than I might otherwise have done at 4/10.

Though it's competently-made (for the most part), this otherwise tacky action-comedy from producer Roger Corman and New World Pictures is meant to be a sexy T&A spy flick--but neither the T nor the A is very enticing. In a cameo as the leggy editor of Ultra magazine, Corman-mainstay Mary Woronov gives the picture its best five minutes. She sends her photographer to Hong Kong to shoot three girls for the next cover; he's assigned two professional models and another girl of his choosing--a naïve, clumsy fashion assistant with a bad perm. The movie cobbles together stray ingredients--a roll of secret microfilm, a travel agent trained in karate--with fashion shoot montages (in slow-motion!), as well as the three ladies in and out of their clothes. Frankly, I kept waiting for Woronov to fly to Hong Kong to give this turkey a kick in the A. NO STARS from ****