Cherry Falls: USA Films
Rating: USA: R

While skimming through some of the user comments for the slasher film Cherry Falls, I noticed that one author had made the observation that the film was ‘Scream meets American Pie--an observation that works pretty well, at least in the most rudimentary sense. Yes, Cherry Falls is a film that attempts to cross the postmodernist slasher film (and all of the hip baggage that comes with it) with teen cinema’s newest craze, the teen sex flick. Unfortunately, the film never manages to live up to either of its inspirations—and the end result is a film that shows a fair deal of promise but is lacking overall.

The plot is invariably what draws people to the film—it’s got a fairly inspired hook. The town of Cherry Falls, Virginia has a psycho killer running loose—a killer who’s knocking off the town’s teenagers. However, instead of punishing those kids who are out there having sex, this killer is targeting the town’s virgin population—thereby changing the ‘sex equals death’ maxim that’s driven slasher cinema since its inception into ‘abstinence equals death’ instead.

I have to admit—it’s a great idea. Unfortunately, it’s the only idea the film has. There’s no need to delve into the plot specifics, because if you’ve seen one slasher film, you’ll know where this one is going. We’ve seen everything here before—the small town with a dark secret, the young virginal heroine (yes, despite all the crowing about needing to have sex to survive, our heroine is still virginal), a murderer with a flimsy motivation, and a few violent set-pieces. Simmer on high for an hour, stir once or twice, and voila, you’ve got a slasher film.

What makes this all so disappointing is that the film seemed to have potential. Director Geoffrey Wright (who directed a young Russell Crowe in the cult film Romper Stomper) went into early interviews talking about how gory and violent this film would be—how it would be the slasher film that outdid every other slasher film out there (which is certainly a hyperbolic statement—I didn’t ever believe that this film would outdo Argento’s Tenebre, Soavi’s Stagefright, Bava’s Bay of Blood, or Carpenter’s Halloween--four films that stand as the pinnacle of slasher cinema as far as I’m concerned). Of course, after dealing with the ‘Hollywood Inquistion’ (aka the MPAA, a heinous group led by the modern day Torquemada Jack Valenti) for a year, all of the gore wound up on the cutting room floor.

Truthfully, though, even with the gore, this film would still have problems. Wright and crew have tried to take the one good idea (inverting the traditional slasher paradigm) and build the whole film around it—and it doesn’t work. Poor writing, weak acting, and a sluggish pace all combine forces to work against the film—and ultimately succeed in causing its downfall.

The script is a bland and predictable thing that tries to ape Kevin Williamson’s postmodernist riffs on the genre (with a great deal more moderation than most of the other ‘new’ slashers), but the writers clearly aren’t up to the task. Like Williamson’s films, Cherry Falls owes a great deal to the Italian gialli (see my review of The Bird With the Crystal Plumage for more info on what constitutes a giallo film)—we’ve got a mentally unbalanced killer who’s human, who wears a mask, and who has some sexual hang-ups. However, unlike the best gialli, there’s no mystery here. Sure, red herrings are sprinkled in liberally, but they’re never convincing. The killer and the motivation become painfully obvious early on, despite efforts to hide the identity behind a wig and through the use of odd camera angles.

The cast isn’t much better than the writing, despite the presence of both Michael Biehn and Jay Mohr. Both Biehn and Mohr make the most of the material, but neither is capable of carrying the film on their own. It doesn’t really matter, though, since the script decides it would rather focus on yet another cast of bland twenty-somethings masquerading as teenagers instead. As you’d probably expect, most of these performances are fairly underwhelming, but none is less impressive than that of lead actress Brittany Murphy. Murphy wanders through the film with a perpetually dazed look on her face, as if even she’s wondering just how exactly she managed to get this job. She evokes zero sympathy from the audience, and is hardly the strong female protagonist a slasher film needs in order to be successful. With a better actress in the lead role, this film might have turned out better—but as it is now, it’s just painful to watch.

The final major flaw deals with the film’s pace. Things start out promisingly enough, but soon we’re going through long stretches with no murders, no stalk sequences, nothing but lots of boring exposition and really banal dialogue. In some ways, it seems as though these scenes were added as filler in order to pad the running time after having to remove all of the gore sequences—still, that’s no excuse for making a film that had me looking at the timer on my DVD player roughly once every three minutes…

As mentioned earlier, there’s really no gore to be found here. Anytime something good might happen, the camera cuts away completely, or shows us quick, nearly subliminal, cuts of the scene—the only way you’re seeing gore here is by giving your pause button a vigorous workout.

What makes this so disappointing is that one would think the producers and directors would release an unrated cut of the film on video, where the lack of an MPAA rating doesn’t equal financial suicide. But, instead, we simply get the same old R-rated cut, a print that’s missing major gore, and features almost no nudity (which should probably be present in copious amounts in a slasher film where everyone’s trying to get laid in order to survive).

Ultimately, Cherry Falls is a slasher film that had a lot of potential, but failed to realize most of it. The central idea of a psycho killing virgins is an interesting one (and one I’m surprised no one exploited sooner), but it’s not enough to build the entire film on. The poor pacing, lack of gore, weak script, and flat performances all rob the film of any promise it might have once had. Releasing an unrated director’s cut with the gore reinserted would make this a better film for sure, but it still wouldn’t be enough to actually make it good.


Recommended:
No

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Better than Watching TV