Cover Girl Models (1975)

"Cover Girl Models," taken at face value, is a really cheapskate production that makes the 1959 Fox movie "Holiday For Lovers" look like "Gone With The Wind." It has a low-rent American cast and locales in The Philippines that masquerade as Singapore and, to a lesser extent, Hong Kong. It gets low marks for being a "thriller" and for its cheesy violence.That said, it gets higher marks for being a time capsule in more ways than one might think. Filmed after Richard Nixon's resignation, it captures the seedier side of 1970s American cinema, with skin exposure that one doesn't find as much anymore. You get to see women's breasts all right. Sadly, the same is said as well of the clothing styles from that era, and also the hair styles. While men's suits look better today, the women here seemed to have more tailored hairstyles. Dull plot, but the memories of 1975 are a welcome watch, especially for those who lived through that time period.

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".

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.

*SPOILER ALERT* *SPOILER ALERT*I bought this one from Blockbuster for five bucks. Three models head off to Hong Kong for a photo shoot. They get involved with a spy ring and some other nonsense. They strike a pose and lose some clothes. Microfilms, revolutionaries and other misfits mix it up with the models. This was a typically brainless 70's exploitation movie. On the plus side, all the models get topless. But the spy storyline was completely inane. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. Most of the movie is spent watching the models model. So we are treated to many fashion shoots. Excited yet? There is a big gun battle at the end but none of the models are topless during it.