PRO BALL CHEERLEADERS GRINDHOUSE TRIPLE FEATURE

After Hours Cinema strike again, this time with a triple offering of smut relating to that All-American fantasy girl, the cheerleader.

The first film proposition is PRO BALL CHEERLEADERS itself, helmed in 1979 and credited to director Jack Mathew (a.k.a. Jack Matthews, who also directed FOXY LADY).

CHEERLEADERS kicks off with a group of excitable young teens turning up at 2pm in their school gym hall for cheerleading try-outs. While their stern gym instructor puts them through their paces, three male judges - the school's football coach Callahan (John Boland), a businessman in a Stetson and a Disco Stu-lookalike - admire the young fillies' performances.

After the show, the wannabe cheerleaders - Freida (Jennifer West), Pepper (Lisa De Leeuw) and Tamara (Candida Royalle) - retire for a scrub down in the showers. Hearing the suspiciously old-looking football team in the neighbouring shower block, the girls sneak in there for a spot of mutual lathering ... but are caught by the Football Coach and gym instructor before things get too steamy.

The gym instructor punishes the girls by having them bend over while she sticks her fingers inside each one and tastes their fanny juice. She then retires to the showers herself for a lesbian tryst with another student, complete with strap-on dildo.

The film progresses in similar episodic fashion from there on in, with a minimal plot serving as a flimsy excuse to leap from one pedestrian hardcore scene to the next. Interracial sex, messy facials, a scene of mutual male/female masturbation and a show-stopping bout of anal sex in torrential rain follow before culminating with a disco-themed climactic orgy, tempered along the way by the occasional crude humour in the linking scenes.

While CHEERLEADERS hardly qualifies as being a memorable experience, it is a fun way to pass 68 minutes. The girls are hot in a natural way and the sex scenes are performed with gusto. The pace is brisk and the tone is bawdy ... what's not to enjoy?

Turk Lyon (HARDGORE; BABYFACE) and Johnny Keyes (FEMMES DE SADE; BEHIND THE GREEN DOOR) are among the lucky fellas. Keen-eyed horror fans may also recognise West as the woman whose sexual escapades in the back of a van come to a bloody end at the beginning of James C Wasson's enjoyably barmy NIGHT OF THE DEMON (1980).

Next up is OUI GIRLS, a Fred Lincoln production from 1981.

This opens with Nick (the eternally sleazy Paul Thomas) and Barbara (Anna Ventura) who drive out to a small swinging ranch to pose as a married couple as they investigate a case of insurance fraud and - gasp - murder.

The plot then becomes more convoluted as we meet the bunch of local goons under suspicion: Cora (De Leeuw again), a clueless motorist who accepts help from a stranger when her car breaks down, only to have him wank off in front of her - she runs to the nearest man to tell him, which ends in an extremely hot blowjob; Laura (Tiffany Clark) and Frank (Michael Bruce) a naive young couple who have invited out-of-towner Francine (Sharon Kane) to their home to experiment in swinging; portly Buck (Michael Morrison), another local who along with everyone else appears to be sex mad.

The plot never truly thickens as the film clumsily throws in embarrassing arguments and all but forgets its mystery plotting for absurdly strong stretches. Not that it matters - OUI succeeds by virtue of some truly hot sex scenes, an interesting cast and Tiffany Clark's dirty dialogue helping to elevate Lincoln's confused narrative into sexier territory.

The highlight of OUI is undoubtedly the sofa-based fuck shared between Thomas and De Leeuw.

Both films are presented in anamorphic 1.78:1. The transfers are generally solid, offering accurate colours and reasonably bright images. Natural grain and evidence of age - specks, vertical lines - are present throughout, but these add to the vintage charm that these films strive for. The opening titles to OUI are soft in comparison to the remainder of the presentation and appear to have been sourced from old VHS.

English audio furnishes both films in slightly muddy mono. Minor hiss is noticeable at some times and occasional pops on the soundtrack can be heard.

Disc one opens with an energetic animated main menu page set to rousing bandstand music.

From there, there's the option of choosing each film individually or going for the now-familiar "Grind It! Play All" function. This plays both films in one double-bill-style method.

Although there are no scene-selection menus, each film can be remote-accessed by way of 6 chapters (CHEERLEADERS) and 7 chapters (OUI).

The only "extra" as such on disc one is a link to an address from where you can order the After Hours Cinema catalogue.

Over on disc two, the triple-bill reaches it's conclusion with 1976's THREE SHADES OF FLESH (a.k.a. SHADES OF SKIN).

Stylish and lengthy opening credits lead us into an introduction to three nubile housemates, Lynn (Leslie Alroe), Diane (Spring Finlay) and Alice (Helen Carrol).

Ebony beauty Diane is busy preparing a meal for her boyfriend Burt with the help of her friends when he calls to cancel their date. It's not the first time he's done this. Then Bill rings redhead Lynn and also cancels. She too is pissed off that the food preparations have all been for nothing.

The girls are spitting bricks, and convince Alice that she doesn't need her goody-goody boyfriend Don (the legendary John Leslie) any more than they need their unreliable toerag partners. Between the three of them, they decide to dump their fellas and "ball any and every guy we want".

And with that miniscule exposition out of the way, that's precisely what they do over the proceeding hour.

Some nice exterior locations play second fiddle to very basic, ugly interiors in this cheap and uninspired film. The sex scenes are so-so for the most part, and the women aren't a patch on those offered over on disc one.

Still, SHADES does at least offer Leslie revelling in the role as what turns out to be a sleazy adulterous cad, some nice lesbian encounters and hirsute hippy seduction later in play.

Directed by Rick Shell under the cheeky pseudonym of Hans Christian, SHADES is an uneven and paceless film that at times threatens to take an interesting BAISE MOI/A GUN FOR JENNIFER anti-men route but instead plays it safe with blowjobs set to classical music instead.

The film is again presented in anamorphic 1.85:1 with English mono audio. The picture quality is faded and worn but easily watchable, while the audio offering is the clearest of all three films.

Although there is once again no scene-selection menu, this 75-minute film can be traversed through remotely via 11 chapters.

Disc two is rounded off with trailers for 8MM MADNESS, SUPER STARS OF THE 70S STAGS, EURO TRASH COLLECTION, BUSTY STAGS COLLECTION, EXTREME SLEAZE SHOWCASE, BUSTY SUPERSTARS OF THE STAGS, A TOUCH OF GENIE, FORCED ENTRY, GRINDHOUSE OCCULT COLLECTION, GRINDHOUSE VIRGIN COLLECTION, SEX SLAVES OF THE SS, WEIRDOS AND THE ODDBALLS, WEST GERMAN GRINDHOUSE COLLECTION and ZODIAC RAPIST.

Another fine package of vintage smut from After Hours Cinema, PRO BALL CHEERLEADERS GRINDHOUSE TRIPLE FEATURE boasts nice hardcore sex scenes and some great industry faces to boot. Okay, only one of the films actually contains cheerleaders but that's not a worry - just lock the door and enjoy!

Review by Stu Willis