Blue Ridge Fall (1999) from Tuna

Blue Ridge Fall is a nifty little indie concerning a group of kids from a North Carolina town. When one of their number, a slightly retarded son of a wife-beating, hard-drinking, bible-spouting father, blows daddy away, they decide the father got what he deserved, and their friend shouldn't be put in jail or in a home, so they hide the body. Things go wrong pretty quickly from there, with the kids in conflict with the law, and everyone's life ruined or worse.

NUDITY REPORT

Britt Leary, as girlfriend of  one of the boys shows a breast in a sex scene.
The friends are a mixed bag. Peter Facinelli is the High School quarterback with good offers for college ball, and the most level headed of the bunch. His steady girl is sister of a deputy sheriff. Indeed, it is the sort of town where everybody knows everybody. Another in the group dropped out of High School and served 6 months in jail. Another is a member of the football team, and pretty much goes along with the group.

DVD info from Amazon.

  • widescreeen format

 The film is nicely photographed, has good pace, and interesting characters, but I am not sure I liked the bittersweet ending. Still, it is worth seeing as a non-comic coming of age buddy movie.

The Critics Vote

  • no major reviews online.

The People Vote ...

  • with their dollars: straight to video
IMDb guideline: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence, about like three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, about like two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, about like two stars from the critics. Films under five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film, equivalent to about one and a half stars from the critics or less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

My own guideline: A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. C means it will only appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover appeal. D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre. F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Based on this description, this film is a C+.

Return to the Movie House home page