About Cherry

18 year old Angelina (Ashley Grace) sells naked pictures of herself to raise money to run away to San Francisco with her best friend Andrew (Dev Patel). She comes from a dysfunctional family and he's secretly in love with her. She gets involved with drug-addicted lawyer Frances (James Franco). Lesbian former porn actress Margaret (Heather Graham) recruits her to be in her film.

Ashley Hinshaw is a fashion model, and she has the acting skills to prove it. Overall the movie had no joy, no pace, no tension, no drama. There is one good scene with Dev Patel, but that's not enough to recommend this film.

I think this is the most shallow film I have ever seen. "About Cherry" is about a bunch of one dimensional people dealing with the most artificial, superficial problems imaginable. Angelina runs away from an alcoholic mom and dad to become...a porno star, yawn. The entire cast is soap opera beautiful, and the performances are mostly soap opera quality, with the exception of Dev Patel, who's talents are wasted in this bomb. How did he even wind up in this thing? James Franco, (who I greatly admire) will do anything for a laugh or a paycheck obviously. Here he plays a dope addict in lust with the porn actress, yawn. "About Cherry" is an indie film, gone horribly wrong. Obviously directed by a horny, younger man, judging by the amount of cheap nudity and (un)erotic lesbian story lines. There is not one moment of this film that feels real, and not one character that is remotely interesting or believable. But Cherry is hot and shows her boobs..a lot.

This is bad without being hilarious. There are some decent actors in this such as Dev Patel, Lily Taylor and perhaps even James Franco. But you're not seeing any good performances from them. It all feels like rehearsals or one take. There's a scene at the bar with the lead Ashley Winshaw and James Franco where I'm pretty sure she breaks and starts laughing but they just leave it in. I really doubt there was a script on this because scenes just play out they have an outline and just fill in the words. There's no subtlety whatsoever in how characters react or what happens. You feel very aware that it's just a checklist of story beats to get you to the end.

I will say there were a couple of moments where I saw a what a good movie about this subject could be. Her being in porn and dating outside of that would be a difficult thing to discuss and work through. Instead characters mostly react with disgust and there's no depth to the subject matter.

Perhaps a shame that there there are flashes of the director trying to convey a message of sorts. But this is certainly not the female version of Boogie Nights. It's just a goofy movie about a girl who wants to be in porn for no particular reason.

Most movies about the business of pornography are moralistic films, showing the exploitation that grinds its participants down and steals their souls (to mix a metaphor).

This is not one of those.

As a movie, it's not sure whether the title character is being ruthlessly exploited, or joyously empowered. She's one or the other both or neither.

A lot of peripheral characters and subplots are drawn in, but all are handled perfunctorily. A lot of star power -- Heather Graham, James Franco, Dev Patel -- is wasted in cardboard roles.

Ashley Hinshaw, playing Cherry, is a beautiful actress, and looks a lot like a younger Heather Graham (no coincidence, I'm sure, in terms of their characters). She doesn't display much range here, and her character is not given a chance to grow (which could be the director's fault).

In the end, it's not bad, but there's nothing there. Despite showing the porn industry, it lacks sleaze; and yet you couldn't call it tasteful. Just dull.

This film had every opportunity to make a fair commentary about sex work being legitimate work. But instead opted for the softball ending. The third act was utterly disappointing in how unbelievably compromised it was. From Franco's drug addled boyfriend character turning to denigrate Cherry, to the total lack of consequence surrounding Margaret's relationship ending and her just simply replacing her former long-term live in girlfriend with Cherry. And ultimately Cherry's absurd move to being behind the camera, like it's a simple task any novice can accomplish with relative ease.

It's as though the script for this film was only partially thought out. And the characters were maligned from the moment they hit the frame. None of the characters had a genuine connection to one another, for example the Francis/Cherry relationship process and especially the Andrew/Cherry dynamic. What a complete wash of over-simplification.

This film is pretentiously fence-sitting and poorly actualized. Makes me sad, because it's a great opportunity that the filmmakers lost.