Briar Patch (2001) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)
Briar Patch (aka Plain Dirty) is about a young woman trying to escape her unpleasant white trash life. Her psychic friend tells her that her true love is near. She assumes that means the sensitive young Richmond lawyer with whom she has been having an affair. Unfortunately, her moonshine drinkin', convenience store robbin', wife beatin' husband ain't a gonna let her leave, so she is virtually imprisoned by hubby and his dimbulb crony, Ol' Flowers, who looks like one of the extras from Deliverance.

Well, that little Lolita just starts in a workin' on Ol' Flowers, puttin' all kinds of idees in his haid, 'bout how iff'n he were to kill that thar husband daid, why, he could have Swain all to hisself.

So he does kill the husband. Kills him daid.

You can imagine that Ol' Flowers is not happy when he realizes that he killed his buddy so that Swain could run off to Richmond and sit on some rich guy's veranda, sayin' stuff like "I do declaya" and sippin' mint juleps with a bunch of guys dressed like Colonel Sanders.

Meanwhile, the cops have figured out that there has been a murder, but they don't see any reason why Flowers would be involved. They figure that the killer must either be the abused wife, striking back at her abusive husband, or the wife's known lover, with whom she moved in after the husband "disappeared".
This is a difficult film to relate to because the characters are all singularly unpleasant, although it might be fortunate that we don't identify with any of them, because every single character in the cast ends up getting the shaft. Except Flowers. He makes out OK, and will probably be available for Deliverance 2: Squeal Harder With a Vengeance.

NUDITY REPORT

None, although there is some lurid cheesecake photography of Dominique Swain (upskirts, braless)

DVD info from Amazon

  • widescreen anamorphic, OK transfer, no features.

Briar Patch languished on the shelves from 2001 until now (May, 2004), unable to land either a theatrical or a home media release, so you can bet that nobody really had much faith in it, and when the release did come, they re-named the film! It has been so effectively closeted that there are no reviews or user comments at IMDB after three years! The people who have voted have assigned an average score of 1.9, about as low as possible.

Viscerally, I can relate to that 1.9. I really hated it. It is an unpleasant and bleak movie filled with repulsive characters.  If I am being honest, however, I have to concede that it is not incompetent, just ugly.

The Critics Vote ...

  • No reviews online.

The People Vote ...

  • IMDB summary. The score (1.9/10) is among the lowest of all time.
The meaning of the IMDb score: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence equivalent to about three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, comparable to approximately two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, equivalent to about a two star rating from the critics, or a C- from our system. Films rated below five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film - this score is roughly equivalent to one and a half stars from the critics or a D on our scale. (Possibly even 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. (C+ means it has no crossover appeal, but will be considered excellent by genre fans, while C- indicates that it we found it to be a poor movie although genre addicts find it watchable). 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. Any film rated C- or better is recommended for fans of that type of film. Any film rated B- or better is recommended for just about anyone. We don't score films below C- that often, because we like movies and we think that most of them have at least a solid niche audience. Now that you know that, you should have serious reservations about any movie below C-.

Based on this description, this is a C-. I really hated it. It is an unpleasant and bleak movie filled with repulsive characters, but it is not incompetent. I think C- is the right score based on the definition, but I sure don't recommend it unless something about the premise really appeals to you.

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