The Playbirds
The Playbirds | |
---|---|
David Sullivan | |
Starring | Mary Millington Alan Lake Glynn Edwards Suzy Mandel Kenny Lynch |
Music by | David Whitaker |
Distributed by | Tigon |
Release date |
|
Running time | 94 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Budget | £120,000 |
The Playbirds is a 1978 British
The film is also known as David Sullivan's The Playbirds, The Playbird Murders, and Secrets of a Playgirl.
Plot
In London, an unidentified serial killer targets female models, strangling each woman and marking the forehead with the number of the victim.
To draw out the killer, Holbourne and Morgan decide to send in an undercover policewoman posing as an up-and-coming Playbirds model. Following "auditions" at the Yard, in which female officers are made to perform
In the final scene, a man who appears to be Hern breaks into Sheridan's flat and strangles her in her bathtub. While committing the murder, "Hern" reveals that he is actually the preacher's twin brother.
Cast
- Mary Millington ... WPC Lucy Sheridan [1][2]
- Alan Lake ... Harry Dougan [2]
- Glynn Edwards ... Inspector Holbourne [2]
- Derren Nesbitt ... Jeremy [1]
- Suzy Mandel ... Lena [2]
- Windsor Davies ... Assistant Police Commissioner [1]
- Penny Spencer ... WPC Andrews [2]
- Gavin Campbell ... Inspector Harry Morgan [1]
- Kenny Lynch ... Police Doctor [1]
- Sandra Dorne ... Dougan's Secretary [2]
- Dudley Sutton ... Hern [2]
- Alec Mango ... Ransome [2]
- Pat Astley ... Doreen [2]
- Ballard Berkeley ... Trainer [1]
- Michael Gradwell ... Terry Day [2]
- Anthony Kenyon ... Dolby [2]
- Ron Flangan ... Wilson [2]
- John M. East ... Media Man [2]
- André Trottier ... Kenny
- Gordon Salkilld ... Police Photographer
- Nigel Gregory ... Expert 1
- Tom McCabe ... Expert 2
- Pat Gorman ... Expert 3
- Susie Silvey ... WPC Taylor
- Cosey Fanni Tutti ... Extra (uncredited)
- Howard Nelson ... Caped man (uncredited)
- Tony Scannell ... Man at depot (uncredited)
Production
Filmed over four weeks in the winter of 1977, The Playbirds was the official follow-up to Come Play with Me, which also starred Mary Millington.[1] In The Playbirds, Millington plays an undercover policewoman investigating the murders of models from David Sullivan's magazine Playbirds. The title sequence shows Millington walking through Soho when it was at the height of its domination by the sex industry, giving a visual record of the district's history.[3] Millington collaborated with director Willy Roe on two further sexploitation pictures, Confessions from the David Galaxy Affair and Queen of the Blues, both released theatrically in the summer of 1979. [2]
Release and reception
The film ran in London for 34 consecutive weeks and took £177,000.[4]
In a contemporary review for
In a 2022 review, Eddie Harrison (a contributor to The List) gave The Playbirds zero stars, characterising it as "grubby, bottom-rung British sexploitation" with a "sub-Giallo plot" and supporting cast made up of "slumming British comedy stars". He condemned the film's "deeply misogynist" tone, noting that while the striptease scenes "[objectify] women in the crudest possible way", the audience is drawn into a series of "vicarious 'thrills' as the same women are hunted down and brutally murdered".[1]
Special-edition DVD / Blu Ray
The Playbirds was released on DVD in the United Kingdom on 9 August 2010 by Odeon Entertainment. The film has been digitally remastered and the disc features an extensive stills gallery, production notes written by historian Simon Sheridan, plus Mary Millington's World Striptease Extravaganza (1981) and Response, a short lesbian film starring Mary Millington, made in 1974.[7] The film was released on Blu Ray in 2020 as part of the Mary Millington Movie Collection. The Blu Ray was released by Screenbound Pictures and has audio commentary by Simon Sheridan and Willy Roe.[8]
See also
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Harrison, Eddie (6 November 2022). "The Playbirds". film-authority.com. Retrieved 8 November 2022.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n "The Playbirds (1978)". BFI. Archived from the original on 28 December 2018.
- ISBN 9781136189364.
- ISBN 9780719058417.
- OCLC 2594020.
- ^ Castell, David, ed. (July 1978). "Background: The Playbirds". Films Illustrated. Vol. 7, no. 83. London, UK: Independent Magazines. p. 409.
- ^ Simon Sheridan. "DVDs & Blu-rays". Mary Millington.
- ^ "Screenbound Pictures: Come Play With Me and The Playbirds Restoration Comparison". Blu-ray.com. 1 April 2020. Retrieved 13 October 2020.
Bibliography
- Keeping the British End Up: Four Decades of Saucy Cinema by Simon Sheridan (fourth edition) (Titan Publishing, London) (2011)
External links
- The Playbirds at IMDb
- The Playbirds at AllMovie