The Cheerleaders

I've watched this film twice and I cannot think of how much more daring this film is compared to something like "American Pie". Incredibly stupid script with just horrendous attempts at acting. This film does deliver the goods. More nudity than some porn films! Could a film like this get made today? All the actress's in those late night Cinemax movies seem to have stipulations regarding their career's and I'm not sure they would do it. I tried to look up the actress's in this film and see if they went on to do anything else and a couple appeared in one or two other low budget films but none seem to make a career out of acting. I keep thinking some went into real porn under different names. Anyway, silly and fun flick really is a statement of some of the exploitation that was made in the 70's and the attitude towards nudity in film.

Anybody else out there completely sick and tired of the mindless, that's not even a strong enough word, how about aggravating, sex flicks that Showtime and Cinemax pump out nowadays. Using the same 4 actresses, and the same un-interesting storyline? And I've actually come to hate the 3 effeminate actors who are in every one. It's like a non-ending, awful awful, soap opera with nudity. Soft-core cinema, has hit an all-time low. The production values are great, but the storylines and sex conjure one word - Boredom. Somehow, the modern filmmakers have managed to take the sexual appeal out of women with perfect bodies. I mean I never thought I would see the day, when a skin flick on TV late night would force an involuntary roll of the eyes and send me straight for TV Land reruns, but its really come to that. What's missing, one of the things I can nail down at least is Raunch. Yes, soft core is now politically correct if you can believe that. Almost like its women who are making these to draw in both male and female audiences, and folks it just don't work. Kudos to Showtime for digging up movies like this one. It's totally nasty and wrong, but without going hardcore, that's what's needed to push the buttons. I know there are a zillion more, because I remember them when I was a kid. I would hope they start getting some airtime. Retire the silicon sleep inducers already please, and let the producers go back to making man-hating dramas on Lifetime.

Aside from horror , 70's sexploitation is my second favorite genre and The Cheerleaders is a real winner in the "so bad it's good " category. This movie has it all , girls that seriously look real young instead of movies where the "highschool" girls are reaching mid 30's these girls look actually 18...hell Stephanie Fondue looks actually 16..it's scary. So we've got raunchy comedic sex , the sex in this movie is more on the bizzare comedic side rather than the hardcore explicit side..this is most notorious in the football orgy , and the memorable sex scene between the cheerleader coach and the blonde on the gym bike while bad classical music plays in the background. The film itself gets boring in some parts that just draaaaaaag...but it has enough sex to keep you interested. This is not for people seeking quality filmaking , or even for hardcore porn fanatics...it's just the perfect popcorn film for late night viewing..

Oh I also taped this off The Movie Channel late at night after learning it and Showtime air the complete uncut 84 minute version instead of the reportedly heavily edited video version..so if you want a copy of this until this comes on DVD unedited I suggest making yourself a copy...

I found "The Cheerleaders" to be the best of the sexploitation films, much more entertaining than 'Flesh Gordan', 'Beyond the Valley of the Dolls', 'Fritz the Cat' The crowds really loved the picture, the laughter tended to drown out some of the following lines. Everyone left with a smile on their face. We played it to a packed house nightly. The print that we has was x-rated, though soft core. I do not believe it was a self imposed x, as the beginning of the had the MPAA X rating with the blue background preceeding the title and credits. I was operating the Star Theater in Coshocton, Ohio. We opened the film the first week of January 1974. The prosecuter saw our advance advertising and threatened to arrest us if we showed the film. I had a partner, and we first decided to 'pull' the film and got 'Lady Sings the Blues' as a backup-even changed the marquee to 'Lady Sings the Blues'. We reconsidered and called the prosecuter's bluff, showed 'The Cheerleaders', we did not get arrested. The Coshocton Tribune's lead story on 01/04/74 was 'Theater Told to Pull X Rated Feature'. We sold out in 15 minutes of opening, the film held the house record until beaten by 'The Exorcist'. We brought it back a few months later with equally good ticket sales. Why? word of mouth, it was a crowd pleaser, this was before videos, DVD's, cable was basic, the raunchy language and nudity still had shock value-especially in a small town.

As far as these sort of trashy and sleazy. soft-core productions go, this was absolutely a great and a real fun one to watch.

Of course the movie is being totally simplistic with its story and the movie is basically some total nonsense from start till finish but they at least managed to make it a very fun watch. Seriously, the movie is deliberately being more of a comedy, which was a true great approach for the movie to take with its silly concept.

It's a soft-core flick, so that means it's mostly being filled with female nudity but the sex itself is never anything explicit or something that goes too far, unless you find the premise of the movie already an offensive one to begin with. And believe me, I can see how this can offend some people. Basically the message this movie is sending out is that all cheerleaders should be seen as sex-objects and they will do ANYTHING for the team, including sleeping with the opposing team to wear them out, the day before the game. Really, sex seems to be the only thing that's on the mind of these young girls. And when they don't have a cute guy around, they use the coach, or someones father, or each other, to get their pleasures.

But key to liking this movie is to take nothing in this movie too seriously. And how could you really? It's often so silly and over-the-top, that you just can't ever take this movie seriously in any way.

It's a movie that is filled with lots of sexual innuendos and sexual orientated jokes. And I must say, the movie make me laugh quite a lot. I won't exactly say that the movie was ever being very clever with its jokes but it often was something so silly and random that it actually really works out great, comedy-wise. The timing is really spot on at times and it's actually a pretty well made and directed movie, all things considering.

Another reason why this movie just works out great and fun is because all of the girls are really fun to watch as well. I'm not just talking about it that they are pleasant and fun to look at but they also obviously had fun doing this movie, which shows on the screen and helps to make this an overall very fun experience. None of the acting is great but yet at the same time I can call it a really well cast movie because all of the girls suit their roles so very well. The movie besides did a great job at casting as many different looking girls as possible. It makes them easy to distinguish from each other and allows the movie to give each of them a more or less unique personality.

Really truly one of the most fun movies I have seen in a while.

7/10

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