Under The Cherry Moon [1986]

Another Razzie winner, this film is both starring and directed by Prince. In some ways, this makes sense. The movie is heavily based on vibes and there is definitely interest in the visuals. The film is in black-and-white and set in Nice with some distinct Casablanca ambiance in the opening scene. The costumes are all really interesting to look at and, with the exception of a lot of Prince's clothes specifically, surprisingly stylish for the 80s, a notoriously horrifying fashion decade. The sets are very beautiful and meant to evoke old money wealth. The problem is the actual substance of the film. 

The film revolves around Prince's character, Christopher, and his friend Tricky who are basically on a quest to marry rich women to get money out of them in the divorce. They set their sights on a rich girl who just turned 21 and is supposed to get a $50,000,000 trust. Over the course of the film she and Prince supposedly fall in love. I say supposedly because they have no chemistry and spend a lot of the film arguing. In the end, he gets shot for kidnapping her and she funds Tricky's desire to own an apartment complex in Miami while Prince plays music in heaven.

The film is just odd. A lot of plot explanation is dropped in conversation long after we needed it, and the dialogue is hard to follow anyway because the sound mixing is atrocious. The film is scored by Prince and the Revolution, of course, but the balance is so bad we can't hear the actors a lot of the time. And then there's just the plot in general, which is thin and unconvincing. There were some comedic music stings (which maybe weren't supposed to be funny) and some really bad acting moments, but overall it was only okay. Definitely an interesting curiosity, but you don't have to add it to your list unless you really need to hear those 80s jams.

Spoon Rating: 4

The Lonely Lady [1983]

This film was a Razzie winner in its time and it deserves that title for being so bad in such a hard to articulate way. This movie was never quite what we thought it was going to be, and those surprises got a strong reaction. Let me try to explain.

The film starts with an award show (basically the Oscars but not) where a woman is entering alone and because of this she is assumed to be no one. Flashback to her high school days when she won an award for writing and later that night is raped by a hose. Yeah, we were shocked too. The owner of the house where this happened is a famous screenwriter who goes to talk to her and this sparks up a connection. They marry. He's at minimum 35 years older than her. The marriage goes sour after a while due mainly to him being jealous of her ability after giving her a chance at writing on one of his films. She then has an affair with an actor and tries to get a script she wrote looked at. She doesn't get a deal but she does get an abortion. Then she gets a job working at a club where the club owner, who she eventually screws, offers to send out her script. He doesn't but she does get duped into having sex with a couple who she thinks will help her. Finally she gets "help" from a producer and his wife, but it seems to be a lavender marriage where she has to screw the wife to get her movie made. It does get made and she wins her Noscar for it and she uses her speech to basically admit she fucked her way to the top and it wasn't worth it. 

This film was wild. Aside from the plot, there were some incredible moments of melodrama and the surprise of her speech at the end was honestly pretty satisfying. The thing we really can't figure out though is the title. She's metaphorically lonely in the sense that she is left out to dry by everyone, but she doesn't seem to be at a loss for companionship at all. 

Also the lead actress was apparently Little Miss Muffet in Adam's childhood favorite of Mother Goose Rock n' Rhyme. Glad to know she did something else even if it was this.

Spoon Rating: 5