Mama's Dirty Girls (1974)

What a beautiful movie!

Don't Believe the Hype

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Ahaa, the perfect example of exploitation. This flick is still unreleased on VHS or DVD, you will have to catch yourself a rental VHS only available in the US. That's weird because some famous people are involved in it. The first shot you see is nudity from Candice Rialson, famous from 'Pets' another exploitation from 1974. She surely is know for her exploitation appearances and for her beauty. She sadly died in 2006 of a liver disease. Gloria Grahame, is another famous name and past away in 1981 from cancer. Her last flick being a horror, The Nesting (1984). the story line is very simple and sometimes it keeps you wondering how stupid some things are. But it's exploitation in its purest way, nudity and a lot of it, car chasing, teasing, seduction. It's low on blood, but is still watchable. If you're into 42nd sleaze, buy it.

This is more early 70's "hicksploitation"; a very low-budget film that borrows heavily from already low-budget, Roger Corman-produced fare like "Bloody Mama" and "Big Bad Mama", except that it seems to be set in the present day. Like "Big Bad Mama" especially it focuses on an older female criminal and her sexy daughters as they seduce and murder wealthy men. The mother marries the men, the two older daughters seduce them, and then they all kill them. The plot of this movie is actually pretty stupid. It is not really necessary to kill these men, nor if they're going to murder them is it really necessary to seduce them. And they're also pretty dumb criminals--their first target isn't even wealthy while their second is a dangerous widower who may have murdered his own wife. The ending is a lot less than action-packed--you get the idea they ran out of both money and coherent ideas.What really redeems this movie though is the stellar cast. The mother is played by Gloria Graham, an actress whose B-movie career stretches all the way from 50's film noir like "The Big Heat" to 70's drive-in fair like this or the underrated horror flick "Blood and Lace". Despite a weak script and no-budget she holds her own here against the likes of Shelly Winters or Angie Dickinson who played similar roles in the Corman pictures. Then there are TWO 70's drive-in queens. Candice Rialson was not a great actress and only appeared in a handful of movies (most famously as a very tempting college co-ed who tries to seduce Clint Eastwood in "The Eiger Sanction"), but she was always VERY sexy, and her character here is such a malicious minx she not only tempts her stepfather by lolling around in a skimpy bikini, but she also cruelly teases a semi-retarded handyman just for the fun of it. (She also has some memorable nude scenes). Then there's Sondra Currie, older sister to Cherie and Marie Currie of the music group The Runaways. Currie was kind of second-rate Claudia Jennings (who really should have been in this), but she's still great as the oldest sister who is not only sexy but vicious--she not only seduces her cop boyfriend into the murder plot, but commits a "criss-cross" murder to hook him in as well. (Unfortunately, Currie apparently had a no-nudity clause in her contract, which is regrettable in itself, but also results in dumb scenes where she's covering her bare breasts with her hands for no apparent reason while lying in bed with her boyfriend).The youngest sister is the good one who's not involved with the seductions or the murders, and the actress who plays her is not very memorable. But the cast is rounded out nicely by Annika DiLorenzo as the cop's wife. While Currie and Rialson were somewhat talented, DiLorenzo was never more than a really nice piece, but she made quite an impression both on screen (where she played one of the slave girls in the extra near-hardcore footage Bob Guccione inserted into "Caligula") and off (where she was a Penthouse Pet of the Year and reputedly a mafia moll for several members of the Gambino family). This movie, as a movie, is a waste of time, but this cast might just be worth it.

Mama's Dirty Girls is a gritty little seventies thriller, which reminded me a lot of 1974's other mother and daughter seducing men flick, Big Bad Mama; only with less humour. Typically, the production values are not very good and the film doesn't have a great deal of credibility when judged against serious films. However, like many seventies thrillers; Mama's Dirty Girls makes for a fun watch and while things like the acting aren't up to much; it's not important as nobody goes into a film like this expecting great acting and there's more than enough in the way of sleaze and nudity to make up for it. The plot focuses on 'Mama' and her three daughters. Mama marries men with money and then sets up situations that end with their death, leaving her to inherit the fortune. Naturally, she decides to teach her daughters to do the same thing and the four of them move to a new town. There, Mama meets Harold; a rich man whose wife died under questionable circumstances. Mama marries him, but he doesn't play along with her plans for him to go the same way as her previous husbands.The film begins with a scenario in which Mama's current husband plays away with one of the daughters and ends up "committing suicide". It's not great or all that well put together, but it sets the film up nicely; and actually ends up being one of the best parts. While the film is mostly fun throughout, there are times when the plot isn't entirely interesting and this does bring the whole piece down a bit. At just eighty minutes, Mama's Dirty Girls doesn't really have time to get too boring, however, and I'm sure most viewers won't have much of a problem with the 'downtime'. The girls don't particularly impress with their performances, but they do well in other ways. The film features a fair bit of nudity, which is always welcome in films like this (and, films not like this) and the girls look nice too, which is a bonus. There's a fair bit of violence too; though nothing too shocking. It all boils down to a suitably downbeat conclusion which sees the lead characters pretty much get what they deserve! Overall, this is a decent slice of seventies trash and fans of such films could do a lot worse!

If this film had been directed by Russ Meyer it would have been so much better. The gals sure look good and the guys are either dumb or studs (or both) and Meyer's cartoon style of film making would have turned this threadbare romp into good fun. Oh well, one can't have everything and we do have down on her luck Hollywood old-timer Gloria Grahame in good form as the feisty 'Mama' looking for gullible men to marry so she can bump them off for their money. When she is not on screen however, boredom stretches to the horizon and you may want to read a newspaper or find something else to do until she returns.