Movie review – “Revenge of the Cheerleaders” (1975) **

The skeleton in David Hasselhoff’s cinematic closet – actually he’s got nothing much to be ashamed of playing a jock boyfriend of one of the hero cheerleaders. This is set at a high school where the jocks and cheerleaders behave like Roman nobles during Caligula’s time – they drink, party, take their clothes off, have orgies, never attend class. A new principal comes in to introduce some law and order but it turns out dodgy property developers have their own plans for the school.

The film is a quasi-dance musical – the characters keep breaking out into dance numbers; although some of the cast aren’t very good at dancing (the sweet Rainbeaux Smith seems to struggle), some are (I get the feeling the male actors all came from dancing) and it gives the film a lot of energy. There’s lots of sex and nudity (even some topless dance numbers), and it is very high spirited – similar in tone to the later Rock n Roll High School. The fact one of the cheerleaders gets pregnant in the end adds this odd note of realism to all the debaucherous anarchy.