While trying to come up with a movie to team up with Hank with, I ran into a YouTube video talking about horror movies no one has seen. Usually I’ve seen every movie on their lists, but this one had a movie I’ve never heard of called Cherry Falls.
The concept seemed fun enough, a slasher movie much like My Bloody Valentine, but kills virgins. Plus it came out in 2000, making this 25 years old, funny enough 25 years ago is relevant to the plot of the movie.
So obviously this needed to be high on the list of options. The movie also has a fantastic cast with Brittany Murphy and Michael Biehn.
Everyone knows Brittany Murphy from Clueless, but she was also in this amazing TV movie called David and Lisa, a romantic comedy about her having a split personality, running off with a guy she met in the psych ward. It’s been years since I’ve seen it, so it might not hold up, but I loved it when it premiered.
And let us not forget Michael Biehn! He shows up playing her father and town sheriff with a dark secret. I have no idea what happened to Michael Biehn and why he stopped being in movies. After watching Cherry Falls you’ll be asking yourself the same thing.
Michael Biehn is great, and Brittany Murphy is also great in this, even with lines in it like “Holy hymens, Batman! They’re killing virgins!”.
There were a few more bad but memorable lines, but I can’t remember what they were. I know one was something also involving hymen, with “hymen massacre”.
The main issue I had with this movie was the lack of kills and nudity. It’s a slasher film that mostly cuts away from the gore or we just see the aftermath. And as for the nudity, with a plot like this, you’d expect a boob or two but there’s nothing unless you count the corpse in the morgue.
And from what I found out, this film was a lot more graphic, going through several re-edits to get it down to an R rating.
The also might be why I’ve never heard of this movie because even with the cuts, this still didn’t get shown in theaters. In 2000, this was the time of terrible Scream copycats, so this would have most likely cleaned house if it was released back then.
Even though the nastier cut was never released, the footage from what I heard still exists. They released a Blu-Ray version back in 2020, but it is still sadly the edited version.
Major disappointment here as this film clearly feels edited and watered down. I can see folks recommending it to others who have never heard of this movie, but much like me, I’m sure they are going to feel a bit letdown by it.
We do start things off right as the film opens on a couple of teen sucking face in a secluded part of the woods. But our horny dude gets a bit too into it, causing the girl to scratch his face to get him off her.
You’d think that would probably be the end of their night, but they go right back at it., picking up right where they left off.
Watching them in the shadows we see an old car, shining its headlights into their face as they try to make out.
The Dude gets out to confront the person behind the wheel, only to get attacked by a knife wielding maniac.
This was the first sign that the kills were heavily edited, as you really don’t see much.
Later that night, we move to our main characters Jody and Kenny, Jody played by Brittany Murphy, who is cute as a bug in this.
Jody and Kenny are also playing mouth puncher with their tongues, but Jody pulls away when things go too far for her.
The lip smacking came to an end just in time since her mom pulls up behind them, instantly flirting with Kenny.
I was very confused at first by the relationship of the mother, as she seems to live with Jody and is married to Jody’s dad, played by the awesome Michael Biehn, yet I don’t think these two ever share the screen together in a single scene. It’s so bizarre, so much so I started to think maybe the mom was imaginary or something.
But Kenny was talking to her, so that can’t be the case. It was just so strange, I’m not sure the reason for it. Maybe that’s another thing to add to the list of shit they just cut from the movie.
Or maybe they just forget to film a scene with her parents actually interacting with one another. Who knows!
Oh yeah, Jody and Kenny break up because she won’t have sex with him. I like Jody, she’s great. But unfortunately, we are forced I think to also like Kenny. Kenny sucks.
The film introduces a lot of characters, much like Scream and like that movie, you think the story would revolve around them getting picked off one by one. But half the characters I’m not even sure what happened to them.
As Jody goes inside, her dad is there waiting for her. He’s a stern sheriff, scolding her for being out late but is called away when reports of the murdered teens comes in.
Here is our first continuity error, as when he leaves the house to go to the crime scene it is night, but when he arrives at the scene it is now day. Hell of a long drive, I guess.
At the scene we see the boyfriend was just stabbed to death, while the girlfriend was put on display, with “virgin” carved into her leg. I don’t think we actually get a shot of that, we barely see what happened to the body of the girl, just that she was nailed to a tree stump.
It gets even worse later on with the editing, as I honestly have no clue what was done to her. From what I hear, it was the scene that most likely kept getting in the way of the R rating. Which explains why it was cut to hell.
It isn’t until that murder the sheriff starts to suspect the killer is only going after virgins. He organizes a meeting at the school with all the parents, letting them know what is happening. Jody is still at school with her favorite teacher played by Jay Mohr.
Remember when Jay Mohr was in everything for some reason? I know he’s still consistently working, but it seemed like he was in everything in the 90’s.
As the parents are meeting, Jody runs into the school token gay character and gossip reporter. So clearly he is the next to die. We only see his body, which does kind of work here as it’s a trap to lore Jody into a spot for the killer to get her.
She manages to get away, giving the killer’s description. A description that seems terribly familiar to someone in the sheriff’s past.
The sheriff and the principal of the school share a dark secret. When they were teens, they ran into a young girl from school and raped her, resulting in a child.
Now that kind of narrows the list of suspects down, as this happened 25 years ago, making the child the same age.
And since you can rule out the kids that kind of only leaves two suspects. There’s a female deputy that was acting super suspicious, as she is given the task of following Jody to keep her safe, but the vibes with her are weird.
But she’s too small. Which only leaves one other person. The hot caring teacher Jody has a crush on. Who might actually be her brother.
Because of how strange Jody’s mom acts most of the time, I thought maybe it could have been her. I also think Kenny would have worked if they revealed he was actually older than he says he is.
Anyway, after hearing that the killer is only going after virgins, the teens organize an orgy to lose their virginity. Even Jody’s dad is like can you please screw your boyfriend, so I don’t have to worry about the killer coming after you?
This is another section of the film that gets heavily edited, as it contains from what I hear the most nudity, I think earning them an NC-17 rating.
But it’s so edited to hell, I have no idea what is going on most of the time. Most if not all our other characters are gathered at this party, which is right next door to the teacher that’s our killer. So obviously a massacre is going to take place.
But I don’t know who lives and who survives. This whole ending is kind of a mess. It’s clearly way more graphic than what we are seeing, as we see in one scene a kid just has a severed hand resting on top his head. I have no idea why it’s there, whose hand it is, nothing.
Think back to Scream where at the party at the end, after introducing all these characters, most likely to die, they instead do nothing and just run out of the party, and we never see them again.
That’s basically what happened here. Like, what happened to Jody’s best friend who was obsessed with the stoner kid? She just vanishes from the movie.
It’s all so very frustrating because I think this could have been a much better movie. I see what they were going for, it’s a sexier version of Scream, but man did the censoring screw this movie over.
There’s an awesome movie here, there’s just pieces missing. Even with those missing pieces, I can see why this has gotten the reputation and cult status is has.
I think given this movie feels edited, I can’t give it a higher rating than RENT. It just wouldn’t be honest as it does feel like a movie with things missing from it.
And that officially ends Horror Month, guys! Happy Halloween!
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