For far too long wearing the kind of movie-jail cowbell that once hung around the necks of films like Heaven’s Gate, Ishtar, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me and Halloween III, Under the Cherry Moon has been waiting for its moment of reevaluation. It happens far too often: A film that doesn’t play by anything close to established rules is not only ignored at the box office, but also mocked — reduced to a punchline. But now, 40 years after the film’s original theatrical release to much bewilderment of all sorts, the time is right to take a journey with Prince and Jerome to the French Riviera, and a world of leisurely baths, copious flutes of Champagne, and a sense that fantasy holds a secret card (and possibly a jeweled headdress) for us all.
A romantic tragedy focused on big emotions and incredible outfits, a buddy comedy and a light social satire — and a musical mutation that, like its star/director, redefines itself with each cut — Under the Cherry Moon jettisons Purple Rain’s Greek tragedy of a narrative (and rapturous color scheme) for a black-and-white vibe that feels more like Éric Rohmer (or a more PG-13 Radley Metzger), with a Fassbinder/Scorsese cameraman and a healthy appetite for more.
Gigolo and piano man Christopher Tracy (Prince) has a nice life working the ivories at a restaurant/nightclub with a staggering view of the Mediterranean. He slips in and out of the beds of the richest and most powerful women, staying one step ahead of the landlordress (Emmanuelle Sallet, from The Perils of Gwendoline) and a coterie of pissed-off husbands. Along with sidekick/brother/manager Tricky (Jerome Benton, stealing almost every scene he’s in), he’s got the dream many would aspire to. But then, wouldn’t you know it, along comes Love to knock him down a peg or two and teach him about being something more. In this case, Love is the radiant Mary Sharon (Kristin Scott Thomas, a delight in her first on-screen role), an heiress and bonne vivante exhausted by a debutante life of beautiful holdings. And honestly, couldn’t everyone use Prince popping into their life to help figure things out?
So in one corner we have Prince, the arts, music, taking your friends shopping, several peerless songs and the mad ecstasy of doing it in a seaside cave surrounded by candles. In the other corner we have Mary’s father, the angriest white man you can imagine (played by Steven Berkoff with all the seething, over-the-top rage that’s been steeping since Eddie Murphy made a fool of him in Beverly Hills Cop), and with him are henchmen, the cops, a cauldron of bats and the knowledge that to love something mortal is an inescapable cage.
The Scene’s late, great film critic and editor Jim Ridley spent about 17 years of our friendship trying to convince me how awesome this movie was, and he was right. So don’t let it take a wave of heavy shit to knock out your defenses and clue you in to one of the most daffy, delightful experiences waiting to be explored. And that says what?
For its 40th anniversary, Under the Cherry Moon will screen two times in 35 mm at the Belcourt on Monday, July 13.
