Classic Review: The Centerfold Girls (1974)

The Centerfold Girls (1974) is like any other sexploitation film; beautiful women being terrorized in the nude. However, unlike most of the others films in this genera, The Centerfold Girls (1974) has a great story to accommodate and justify the nudity and violence.

“The most beautiful girls in the world…” refers to the cast of twelve beautiful centerfold models whose lives are about to be cut short for their lack of shame. A thin, creepy man wearing saddle shoes and an ill-fitting suit drags the nude body of a young woman along an otherwise empty beach. Soon a number of other beautiful women turn up dead. Nurses, students, stewardesses… what’s the common thread? All were centerfold models for a popular men’s magazine, prey to a bloodthirsty psychotic with a straight razor!

Andrew Prine's take on the depraved religious fanatic who sets out to punish all the "immoral" women who posed for the tasteless men's magazine is fantastic. His creepy charms and manorisums match that of a deranged psycho; the way he delivers 'crazy' through wide cold eyes is most memorable. And the simple yet classic straight razor murder weapon works to the films advantage adding a more elegance to the murders as opposed to the typical over the top butchery of other similar films.

"The most beautiful girls in the world! He was their JUDGE... JURY... and EXECUTIONER!"

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Classic Review: The Fly (1986)

David Cronenberg's The Fly is a classic movie that is hunting to the very last scene. It's a modern Frankenstein, where the mad scientist himself becomes an even madder experimental monster.

Though it's one of the most powerful movies ever made about the beast inside man, The Fly is not for the weak of stomach or faint of heart. The creative and original mind of David Cronenberg, makes us watch human organs become expendable as spare parts. Seth's hair falls out in tufts, his fingernails drop off, exposing the pupal- stage insect beneath, then his ears, nose... Jeff Goldblum embraces the insect nature of the fly side of his mind; his acting only heightening the amazing visual transformation.

"Be afraid, be very afraid," The Fly is very underrated for such an amazing achievement. Anyone who's witnessed a beloved die of cancer or other soul-destroying disease will recognize the horror of The Fly: the decomposition of a living human. Death redefines life. The transformation of the tender scientist into brutal fly is a specter that penetratingly redefines humanism.

In The Fly, Cronenberg literally shows us what distinguishes man from beast. Some call it conscience. The Fly is a humanist plea in horror-movie clothing. Parts of it are unwatchable. But it's unforgettable.

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