Cherry, Harry & Raquel!

Russ Meyer is a genius at cutting films. And from other examples of his work you can tell he had the whole multi, jump cut vision in his head. Shooting plenty of coverage to get the whole hyper-active, ceaselessly interesting story told. But Cherry, Harry and Raquel was completely shot when the lab ruined over half the footage. Meyer was forced to improvise and Uschi Digart became the scene padding "Muse". The afterword narration becomes a completely overboard retelling of the whole movie. But for all those sad concessions to losing whatever Meyer might have made of this story, it's one of my favorites. Charles Napier absolutely rules. He must have double the muscles in his forehead and scalp than the ordinary mortal as evidenced by some of the mugging he does in this flick. Meyer's kinetic film cutting was far ahead of it's time. The climactic final shoot out is just bloody and macho and totally hilarious stuff.

To all the critics who consider Meyers work near porn I always say this, he essentially makes Carry On style movies and but adds boobs to keep peoples attention.

Granted they aren't as funny as the Carry On classics but they do have their own special charm once you get past the gratuitous usage of a certain pair of popular lady parts.

Sadly this particular Meyer film lacks any laughs at all, is short on charm and with the exception of the always excellent Napier even the cast falls flatter than a flat thing on the flattest day of it's life flattened by an electrified flattening machine. So fairly flat! I didn't see this one until adulthood whereas many of the others I was younger and maybe there is a connection there. Not suggesting at all that I watched Russ Meyers movies as a youngster for any nefarious reasons but now into adulthood the mere sight of a nipple does not make me jump up and down, whistle and bang my head with a frying pan repeatedly looney toon style.

The story takes place in the Nevada desert… Frank Bolger is a conspicuous man in the community who also happens to run a drug-smuggling ring on the side… The local sheriff is in on it, acting as his hit man.

After a hot scene with one of the local women, Bolger orders the sheriff to eliminate the Apache (John Milo), an Indian who has been cutting into their marijuana sales... The sheriff reluctantly agrees, takes the boss's woman home, and relieves his frustrations on her before trying to carry the Indian away…

Meyer does indeed have a fascination for very richly gifted women, and this film is no exception… The scene where Bolger talks the nurse into giving him a body massage is a classic erotic tease… Also, Meyer has very cleverly juxtaposed a sensual lesbian scene against a bloody battle between the sheriff and the Indian… But much of the sex is unmotivated… Meyer cuts so quickly, however, that it is more of a lack of respect tease than an exploitive treatment of sex…

Larissa Ely (Raquel) is wonderful as the steamy, sweaty, desert young woman… Linda Ashton (Cherry) is delightful as the sexy nurse, but Charles Napier steals the show as the violent, explosive, cruel of a sheriff

Harry Sledge (Charles Napier) is a small-town sheriff who doubles as a drug runner for an old, rich pervert. He gets involved with the old man's woman, plus another big-breasted girl. Meanwhile he stalks a rival indian dealer in the desert. The film features typical great dialogue, masterful editing, photography and wonderful sex scenes. It also has some great action scenes and is surprisingly bloody. Charles Napier gives one of his best performances. It's a very entertaining 70 minutes.

Russ Meyer's career got raunchier as it went on and his 'more serious' early films as well as his comical later efforts both have their plus points. Cherry, Harry & Raquel comes almost in-between the two sides of Meyer's career and almost feels like a dress rehearsal for the likes of Up and Supervixens, as we get all the raunchiness of Meyer's latter day films but it's incredibly poorly strung together and unfortunately, unlike the later efforts, the result is a film that has a handful of interesting scenes, as well as a bucket load of rubbish and boring ones. At times it feels like Meyer shot a load of footage and just stuck it together. As the title suggests, the plot focuses on three main characters - unsurprisingly called Cherry, Harry and Raquel. Harry is a police sheriff with a sideline in drug smuggling, and a local apache has got wind of this, leading Harry to track him down. Harry also has an eventful love life, with no less than two luscious and buxom beauties to choose from - there's Raquel, a prostitute, and Cherry; a nurse.

Despite not being among his best work, Cherry, Harry and Raquel does feature Meyer's trademark style. We've got plenty of sex and nudity, as well as some fairly vicious violence, some good dialogue and Meyer's trademark fast editing. Most of the film takes place in the desert and this provides a good setting for the movie, and also helps to give the film it's most memorable moments - namely, Uschi Digard posing naked against desert backdrops. This is the first Russ Meyer film to star Charles Napier - the memorable actor who would go on to steal the show in Meyer's 1975 masterpiece Supervixens. He's not as good here as he was in Supervixens; but the performance is something of a landmark as Napier was one of the first men to do a full frontal nude scene. Naturally, Meyer doesn't let his audience down with his choice of actresses; Larissa Ely and Linda Ashton are both great (especially unclothed) and their screen time together is one of the best moments of the film. Meyer often tried to give his films a point and it usually serves only in making his films sillier and more bizarre - and that is the case here too; although the ending monologue will provide some laughs. Overall, this is probably the worst Russ Meyer flick I've seen so far and despite some positive elements - there really isn't much to recommend it for.