The Centerfold Girls has a pretty anodyne poster for what is a decidedly provocative film. It hit cinemas today in 1974 and is about a religious fanatic played by Andrew Prine who wishes to save (read: murder) three women who’ve posed nude for a men’s magazine called Bachelor. The film is divided into chapters, with the story around each stalking target—Jaime Lyn Bauer, Jennifer Ashley, and Tiffany Bolling—given about one third of the running time. Obviously that means—er, sorry, strongly suggests—that at least two of the trio die. Spoiler alert! There could also be collateral damage. Spoiler… allusion?
The movie lacks the tongue-in-cheek aspect of so much sexploitation cinema, falling more into the category of in-your-face grindhouse efforts like Thriller – en grym film and I Spit on Your Grave. In other words, it’s a mean little movie. But one with serious intent. There’s real effort made at character development, for example Ray Danton’s feckless playboy in chapter two. There’s also effort made to make the film look good. It’s cheap but competent, with some Hitchcockian touches added by experienced television and b-movie director John Peyser meant to let cinephiles know he’s no hack.
We came across comments in several places saying the movie is disrespectful toward women. That’s true. Any film that casts any distinct category of human as victims (and in grindhouse it’s usually women) can automatically be seen by some as targeted oppression—especially when that oppression is rampant in the real world. No film called The Centerfold Girls is interested in avoiding that criticism, so you go in knowing that. The result? It’s pretty good. You know what would have been really fun? If they’d made a sequel called The Centerfold Boys about Playgirl models. Beautiful, superficial, basically helpless male models. We should have been 1970s movie producers.
