CHERRY FALLS (REVIEW)

Dir. Geoffrey Wright

Reviewer. Dan Cook

According to Randy Meeks in SCREAM, to successfully survive a horror movie, you must follow three rules - number one of which is to never have sex. However, Geoffrey Wright’s CHERRY FALLS raucously subverts this long established cliché and instead sets up a scenario where being chaste could become a death sentence.

Set in the titular Virginian town, the movie sees the local teen population of Cherry Falls being whittled down by a crazed killer who is purposefully targeting those who have not yet had sex. One of these is Brittany Murphy’s Jody, the plucky daughter of the town sheriff (ALIENS' Michael Beihn) whose connections to the androgynous murderer may be more than meets the eye.

A big hit upon its release in 2000, CHERRY FALLS is a passably entertaining if not wholly disposable horror whose attempts at edgy humour more than often fall flat. It certainly has its fair share of bloody mayhem and the finale, set at an impromptu orgy up organised by the students in order to take themselves off the psycho’s chopping list, is a particularly chaotic highlight.

However, the characters are bland stereotypes, the plot is absurd, the story has more holes than Blackburn, Lancashire, the once cool and trendy script is now as horribly dated as the haircuts and clothing and the identity of the killer is as well disguised as a fedora-wearing walrus on the London Underground. Not one of the better post-SCREAM slashers.