Mama's Dirty Girls

A family of gold diggers. What a way to go. A woman named Mama and her 3 daughters, finds a man with money, have him killed, and get the money in the process. From the last killing, she finds out that the man was a renter, not a owner. The only thing that he owns was the car. So the family goes out and find a widower who owns a motel. A perfect catch. Or is it? It turned out that the widower is a lot more sinister than Mama! His last wife died at his hands. It looks like that they need to be more crafty than him.

This movie has lead to other films years later. I liked it very much. It's a starter.

2 out of 5 stars.

This is more early 70's "hicksploitation"; a very low-budget film that borrows heavily from already low-budget, Roger Corman-produced fare like "Bloody Mama" and "Big Bad Mama", except that it seems to be set in the present day. Like "Big Bad Mama" especially it focuses on an older female criminal and her sexy daughters as they seduce and murder wealthy men. The mother marries the men, the two older daughters seduce them, and then they all kill them. The plot of this movie is actually pretty stupid. It is not really necessary to kill these men, nor if they're going to murder them is it really necessary to seduce them. And they're also pretty dumb criminals--their first target isn't even wealthy while their second is a dangerous widower who may have murdered his own wife. The ending is a lot less than action-packed--you get the idea they ran out of both money and coherent ideas.

What really redeems this movie though is the stellar cast. The mother is played by Gloria Graham, an actress whose B-movie career stretches all the way from 50's film noir like "The Big Heat" to 70's drive-in fair like this or the underrated horror flick "Blood and Lace". Despite a weak script and no-budget she holds her own here against the likes of Shelly Winters or Angie Dickinson who played similar roles in the Corman pictures. Then there are TWO 70's drive-in queens. Candice Rialson was not a great actress and only appeared in a handful of movies (most famously as a very tempting college co-ed who tries to seduce Clint Eastwood in "The Eiger Sanction"), but she was always VERY sexy, and her character here is such a malicious minx she not only tempts her stepfather by lolling around in a skimpy bikini, but she also cruelly teases a semi-retarded handyman just for the fun of it. (She also has some memorable nude scenes). Then there's Sondra Currie, older sister to Cherie and Marie Currie of the music group The Runaways. Currie was kind of second-rate Claudia Jennings (who really should have been in this), but she's still great as the oldest sister who is not only sexy but vicious--she not only seduces her cop boyfriend into the murder plot, but commits a "criss-cross" murder to hook him in as well. (Unfortunately, Currie apparently had a no-nudity clause in her contract, which is regrettable in itself, but also results in dumb scenes where she's covering her bare breasts with her hands for no apparent reason while lying in bed with her boyfriend).

The youngest sister is the good one who's not involved with the seductions or the murders, and the actress who plays her is not very memorable. But the cast is rounded out nicely by Annika DiLorenzo as the cop's wife. While Currie and Rialson were somewhat talented, DiLorenzo was never more than a really nice piece, but she made quite an impression both on screen (where she played one of the slave girls in the extra near-hardcore footage Bob Guccione inserted into "Caligula") and off (where she was a Penthouse Pet of the Year and reputedly a mafia moll for several members of the Gambino family). This movie, as a movie, is a waste of time, but this cast might just be worth it.

Mama's Dirty Girls is a grimy, murder melodrama about a despicable woman (Gloria Grahame!) and her three sexy daughters whom she uses to seduce and manipulate men for money. It doesn't offer much in the way of performances. The actors often look like they wish they were elsewhere. The story though has some interesting twists and the fact that there isn't really anyone to root for makes the film fun in a sleazy, low class kind of way. It has an early 70s, soap-opera-ish pace to it but it's OK to watch if you have nothing better to do.

If this film had been directed by Russ Meyer it would have been so much better. The gals sure look good and the guys are either dumb or studs (or both) and Meyer's cartoon style of film making would have turned this threadbare romp into good fun. Oh well, one can't have everything and we do have down on her luck Hollywood old-timer Gloria Grahame in good form as the feisty 'Mama' looking for gullible men to marry so she can bump them off for their money. When she is not on screen however, boredom stretches to the horizon and you may want to read a newspaper or find something else to do until she returns.

Ahaa, the perfect example of exploitation. This flick is still unreleased on VHS or DVD, you will have to catch yourself a rental VHS only available in the US. That's weird because some famous people are involved in it. The first shot you see is nudity from Candice Rialson, famous from 'Pets' another exploitation from 1974. She surely is know for her exploitation appearances and for her beauty. She sadly died in 2006 of a liver disease. Gloria Grahame, is another famous name and past away in 1981 from cancer. Her last flick being a horror, The Nesting (1984). the story line is very simple and sometimes it keeps you wondering how stupid some things are. But it's exploitation in its purest way, nudity and a lot of it, car chasing, teasing, seduction. It's low on blood, but is still watchable. If you're into 42nd sleaze, buy it.