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.

For the most part, I do not like the movies of Cirio H. Santiago, even though they are exploitation movies. Though I love exploitation movies, I find Santiago's exploitation movies to be cheap and dull. To be fair, "Cover Girl Models" is a little slicker and more polished than what you usually get from Santiago. However, he was unable to pull off in the end fooling the audience to thinking the Filipino filming locations were actually Hong Kong locations. He does throw in some ample toplessness from the female cast, which is welcome. And the movie is well photographed, looking very nice on the DVD. But exploitation fans will probably fall asleep before the end because the movie, except for a couple of genuinely exciting kung fu sequences is extremely dull. If you want to see a good Santiago movie, watch "Eye Of The Eagle 3".

"Cover Girl Models" is one film without much of a plot it's just a vice a feel good story of action and skin with some sexy nude female scenes and sex. Three Young fashion models go to Hong Kong with hopes of shining in a fashion show only to be crashed upon by bad guys. The action is okay still the eye candy of attractive ladies and skin scenes dominate. Overall a cult picture to watch if you enjoyed this kind of stuff from the 70's otherwise it's nothing really great.

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.