The Swinging Cheerleaders (1974)

User Rating:

5.0/10   

Director:

Jack Hill

Writers:

Jack Hill (writer)
David Kidd (writer)

Release Date:

June 1974 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Comedy | Drama | Sport

Tagline:

They gave their all for the team!

Plot:

In order to write an expose on how cheerleading demeans women, a reporter for a college newspaper infiltrates the cheerleading squad. |

Plot Keywords:

Cheerleading | Pretty Girl | Nudity | Nude Cheerleader | Low Budget Film

Cast

Jo Johnston	...	Kate
Cheryl Smith	...	Andrea (as Rainbeaux Smith)
Colleen Camp	...	Mary Ann
Rosanne Katon	...	Lisa
Ron Hajek	...	Buck
Ric Carrott	...	Ross
Jason Sommers	...	Prof Thorpe
Ian Sander	...	Ron
George Wallace	...	Mr. Putnam
Jack Denton	...	Coach Turner
John Quade	...	Belski
Bob Minor	...	Ryan
Mae Mercer	...	Jessica Thorpe
Dion Lane	...	Janie Hamilton
Hank Rolike	...	Bartender

Also Known As:

H.O.T.S. II (USA) (video title)
Locker Room Girls (USA) (reissue title)

Runtime:

91 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Iceland:16 | USA:R | UK:18

Company:

Centaur

Trivia:

Selected by Quentin Tarantino for the First Quentin Tarantino Film Fest in Austin, Texas, 1996. This movie was also featured in the Satan's Cheerleader Camp Film Fest in Austin in 2000, hosted by The Satan's Cheerleaders, who were given special thanks at the end of Grindhouse (2007).

Goofs:

Factual errors: Radio voice over for opening football game states score as 53-0 Mesa. Scoreboard shot shows quarter scores of 21-14-7-12 total 53. However 21-14-7-12 add up to 54.

Movie Connections:

Featured in The 50 Worst Movies Ever Made (2004) (V)

Swingin' women in a swingin' film

Perhaps Tarantino has started the trend of justifying the legitimate place for trash-films in serious movie history. Jack Hill is definitely a one-of-a-kind filmmaker, an obvious maverick who managed to squeeze as many entertaining moments as he could out of his tight budgets (the fact that Roger Corman fired him more than once shows that Hill was a handful, but never seemed to let up). SWITCHBLADE SISTERS is a hoot, as is FOXY BROWN and THE BIG BIRD CAGE. This film, THE SWINGING CHEERLEADERS, while not as good as other Hill films, has some of the touches that made his previous films successful.

The cast is great. Hill was good at finding attractive women to embody his screen characters, and the knockouts here include Colleen Camp and Cheryl (Rainbeaux) Smith. The plot is some silliness about a female reporter infiltrating the cheerleadering squad at Mesa University to get the scoop. Her boyfriend turns out to be a real jerk, and the eventual outcome is a confrontation with the snooty Camp and some pretty ridiculous bad guys.

The film copies some of Corman's nurses movies (political conscious, making sure the token African-American character is there.)Yet, the film also seems to be parodying these more serious-minded New World pictures. SWINGING CHEERLEADERS is fun, and a reminder of what drive-in films were like (most exploitation films nowadays are not this fun).

Jack Hill---the man, the movies...