SUMMER SCHOOL TEACHERS is one of a mini-wave of teaching-themed exploitation flicks that Roger Corman produced in the early 1970s. This has a trio of feminists taking up positions as summer school teachers and dealing with various low life characters, misogynists, and general sexist behaviour. Of course, all of this is merely a cover for a bunch of old-fashioned nudity and sex scenes which are inserted into the script with a wearying regularity. The film is openly low budget and the acting is of that mannered variety that makes it difficult to take seriously, although it makes some decent points at times. Good old Dick Miller is around to prop up the scenery, as per usual.
5 Reviews
Teachable moment
BandSAboutMovies15 March 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Barbara Peeters directed and wrote one of the better of the Corman "occupation" films with this movie, which was produced by Julie Corman. It's a simple story: three girls leave Iowa for a California summer and we watch the way their lives are changed.
Like Sally (Pat Anderson, Bonnie's Kids, Fly Me). She came out here to teach photography and misses her fiancee back home, but that doesn't mean that she doesn't date a whole bunch of men like a former rock star who now works in a grocery store because of his food fetish and another teacher who takes her to the Pussycat Theater and then shoots nudes of her. Sally also hooks up with a movie star named John John Lacey who is Michael Greer from Messiah of Evil.
Or Denise (Rhonda Leigh Hopkins). She gets involved in the life of one of her students when he steals a car. Well, she sleeps with him too, so maybe she's not the best teacher.
The star, however, is Conklin (Candice Rialson, Moonshine County Express). She decides to coach a girl's football team despite the men's coach (Dick Miller) standing in her way.
There's always a trade-off in the Corman occupation films. The best of them - like this one - present a world where women can compete and defeat entrenched male power structures. However, they all are filled with mostly female nudity. That said, in this film, Rialson's character chooses the man she loves, a geeky teacher many would pass by, and she's in complete ownership of her body.
Like Sally (Pat Anderson, Bonnie's Kids, Fly Me). She came out here to teach photography and misses her fiancee back home, but that doesn't mean that she doesn't date a whole bunch of men like a former rock star who now works in a grocery store because of his food fetish and another teacher who takes her to the Pussycat Theater and then shoots nudes of her. Sally also hooks up with a movie star named John John Lacey who is Michael Greer from Messiah of Evil.
Or Denise (Rhonda Leigh Hopkins). She gets involved in the life of one of her students when he steals a car. Well, she sleeps with him too, so maybe she's not the best teacher.
The star, however, is Conklin (Candice Rialson, Moonshine County Express). She decides to coach a girl's football team despite the men's coach (Dick Miller) standing in her way.
There's always a trade-off in the Corman occupation films. The best of them - like this one - present a world where women can compete and defeat entrenched male power structures. However, they all are filled with mostly female nudity. That said, in this film, Rialson's character chooses the man she loves, a geeky teacher many would pass by, and she's in complete ownership of her body.
Some more hard-hitting realism (and gratuitous T and A) from Roger Corman
lazarillo28 May 2010
Three ridiculously sexy girls go from Iowa to Los Angeles to teach summer school in this quasi-sequel to "The Student Teachers". But whereas the first film was marginally realistic and believable, this is completely absurd, but a lot more fun. The students at this school all look like they flunked several years (maybe even a decade or so) and the female students seem to have chosen summer school because the flexible hours wouldn't interfere with their regular gigs as pole dancers. (The girls' PE class, for instance, is first introduced with a close-up pan of their gyrating, barely clad asses). And why would they teach subjects like PE and art in summer school, anyway? What kind of idiot would flunk those subjects? (I actually once taught math in summer school and it was NOTHING like this, although perhaps that was a good thing because I might be in jail right now if all the female students had looked like this).
In typical Corman/New World fashion there is, of course, some amount of serious plot-lines and half-assed feminism thrown in with the gratuitous T and A. One teacher falls in love with a delinquent male student (which even if you're a young, sexy female, is a professional and legal no-no). The art teacher meanwhile inadvertently gets involved in nude modeling. And in the most ridiculous story Candice Rialson tries to start a girls' football team against the wishes of Dick Miller's sexist football coach.
The female director of this Barbara Peeters would go on to direct the cult classic "Humanoids of the Deep", which she complained Corman later went back and salted with even more gratuitous female nudity. Well, I wish he'd done that with this one too, at least with regards the mouth-wateringly luscious Candice Rialson. Seeing a movie like this without regular nude scenes from her is like watching a Laker game with Kobe Bryant sitting on the bench. Seriously though, Rialson was a very appealing low-budget actress and I was sad to learn she died back in 2006. Dick Miller is an institution in Corman movies going all the way back to "A Bucket of Blood", but he actually gets a fairly large and well-developed part here as a macho, sexist coach (at, um, a summer school). This movie has turned up recently on a couple of legitimate DVD collections, so it might just be worth checking out.
In typical Corman/New World fashion there is, of course, some amount of serious plot-lines and half-assed feminism thrown in with the gratuitous T and A. One teacher falls in love with a delinquent male student (which even if you're a young, sexy female, is a professional and legal no-no). The art teacher meanwhile inadvertently gets involved in nude modeling. And in the most ridiculous story Candice Rialson tries to start a girls' football team against the wishes of Dick Miller's sexist football coach.
The female director of this Barbara Peeters would go on to direct the cult classic "Humanoids of the Deep", which she complained Corman later went back and salted with even more gratuitous female nudity. Well, I wish he'd done that with this one too, at least with regards the mouth-wateringly luscious Candice Rialson. Seeing a movie like this without regular nude scenes from her is like watching a Laker game with Kobe Bryant sitting on the bench. Seriously though, Rialson was a very appealing low-budget actress and I was sad to learn she died back in 2006. Dick Miller is an institution in Corman movies going all the way back to "A Bucket of Blood", but he actually gets a fairly large and well-developed part here as a macho, sexist coach (at, um, a summer school). This movie has turned up recently on a couple of legitimate DVD collections, so it might just be worth checking out.
An amiably inane and immaterial 70's drive-in romp
Woodyanders8 June 2006
Warning: Spoilers
A trio of naive, but eager young Midwestern women go to California to teach summer school classes at Regency High School. Perky, willful Candice ("Hollywood Boulevard," "Chatterbox!") Rialson starts up and coaches an all-female football team; she also becomes romantically involved with gawky, but amicable fellow student teacher Christopher Barrett. Stuffy Bible banging chemistry teacher Pat ("T.N.T. Jackson") Anderson manages to loosen up after she falls hard for surly juvenile delinquent Will Carney. Pert, liberated photography instructor Rhonda Leigh ("Cover Girl Models") Hopkins has sex with both a two-faced male chauvinist jerk and a more decent, understanding guy.
This thoroughly inane, amiable, episodic and animated New World Pictures comedic teen sexploitation item sizes up as a hugely enjoyable outing: writer/director Barbara ("Humanoids from the Deep") Peeters keeps the pace quite zippy and the tone suitably lighthearted throughout, the ceaseless barrage of jokes about breasts, buttocks, fat guys, uptight high school authority figures, sex (of course), dirty little old lady peeping toms, dorky middle-aged dudes on the make, and gross macho bozos are very crude, but still pretty funny, the expected romantic interludes are surprisingly tasteful and erotic, the Los Angeles strip club footage is authentically tacky, the sappy bleeding heart "let's give the kids a chance" posturing never becomes too icky-cute, the feminist subtext is slight, yet sincere, there's a reasonably decent automobile chase and a nice subplot about a stolen car ring, and the climactic women only football game manages to be really amusing, if nothing too spectacular. Moreover, the always dependable Dick Miller cuts loose with a riotously hammy performance as a crooked, sexist, vulgar macho swine football coach, the three female leads are sexy, lively and appealing, Eric ("The Hills Have Eyes") Saarinen's handsome, agile cinematography provides lots of lovely, gorgeously lit visuals, and J.J. Jackson's bouncy, ebullient score will plant a mile-wide smile on your face that you won't take off for a week. Now, what more could you possibly want from a blissfully insubstantial, but infectiously effervescent and entertaining goofball time-waster?
This thoroughly inane, amiable, episodic and animated New World Pictures comedic teen sexploitation item sizes up as a hugely enjoyable outing: writer/director Barbara ("Humanoids from the Deep") Peeters keeps the pace quite zippy and the tone suitably lighthearted throughout, the ceaseless barrage of jokes about breasts, buttocks, fat guys, uptight high school authority figures, sex (of course), dirty little old lady peeping toms, dorky middle-aged dudes on the make, and gross macho bozos are very crude, but still pretty funny, the expected romantic interludes are surprisingly tasteful and erotic, the Los Angeles strip club footage is authentically tacky, the sappy bleeding heart "let's give the kids a chance" posturing never becomes too icky-cute, the feminist subtext is slight, yet sincere, there's a reasonably decent automobile chase and a nice subplot about a stolen car ring, and the climactic women only football game manages to be really amusing, if nothing too spectacular. Moreover, the always dependable Dick Miller cuts loose with a riotously hammy performance as a crooked, sexist, vulgar macho swine football coach, the three female leads are sexy, lively and appealing, Eric ("The Hills Have Eyes") Saarinen's handsome, agile cinematography provides lots of lovely, gorgeously lit visuals, and J.J. Jackson's bouncy, ebullient score will plant a mile-wide smile on your face that you won't take off for a week. Now, what more could you possibly want from a blissfully insubstantial, but infectiously effervescent and entertaining goofball time-waster?
this movie makes no pretense about what it is
lee_eisenberg16 September 2013
Roger Corman's wife Julie produces a movie in which a bunch of good-looking babes from Iowa go to California to be teachers, and a bunch of silly things happen. "Summer School Teachers" definitely comes across as a movie made to appeal to the women's liberation movement. Mostly it's all titillation. My favorite part was the scene where the old women are listening to one of the teachers converse with a man, misinterpreting the entire conversation. Whatever the movie's main intention was, it comes out as nice brainless fun, and the final scene affirms that the 1950s mores are LONG gone! The fun lives forever!
PS: Dick Miller (the sexist PE teacher) frequently appeared in Roger Corman's movies, and more recently appears a lot in Joe Dante's movies.
PS: Dick Miller (the sexist PE teacher) frequently appeared in Roger Corman's movies, and more recently appears a lot in Joe Dante's movies.
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