Cherry 2000

Sure is hot in the desert.

“She's blonde, beautiful and forever young.”

Hello and welcome back to The Tagline! I decided that I wanted to continue the new year with a further peek into the distant, misted past, when hairspray was as essential as water, and the future was definitely going to involve some sort of big desert and having sex with robots. Living in an area covered in forest and completely devoid of robots to bang, I don't mind telling you that I am still trying to cope with my bitter disappointment on the matter. I guess I shouldn't get too down, we could still get our deserty sexbot future! It might just be a while, but I suppose patience is a virtue just like they say. ANYWAY today I will be talking about a classic movie about a sexy lady in an american muscle car shooting guys with rockets in a desert while looking for the body of a robotic sex wife. You may or may not have guessed by now that I am talking about Cherry 2000, a cult film originally slated for release in 1985, Orion shelved this film for years basically because they didn't know how to market it, or what to really do with it. Having seen it a number of times, I can certainly understand their confusion and trepidation... I'm not sure how one would classify or explain Cherry 2000, especially in the 80s. The film features a dystopian future US, with a setting somewhere lost between cyberpunk and post-apocalyptic. The year is 2017, and in the wake of a number of economic disasters and civil uprisings, civilization exists in isolated clusters. One man, Sam Treadwell, is a business executive who lives with his limited edition gynoid, (the eponymous Cherry 2000 model) until she short circuits during some very soapy sex, because apparently advanced androids AREN'T WATERPROOF SOMEHOW. That leads to some gross questions about how he has sex with her and keeps her clean, but let's just... not think about that anymore.

That's a pretty nice gun.

Anyway, Treadwell is not going to just let go of his creepy obsession with his robo-wife, who seems REALLY annoying, so he goes out with his money and looks for a tracker who will help him find the very difficult to locate replacement body for his lady. The most important part Treadwell keeps with him however: Cherry's disc that contains her personality and memories. Treadwell meets a tracker named "E" Johnson, who drives around in a mustang full of rockets, has bright red hair (but is not the titular character) and offers to help lead Treadwell to the factory that holds spare Cherry 2000 models, in the no man's land that is Zone 7 (it appears to be in Las Vegas, but it's been reclaimed by the desert). Outside of immediate civilization, the world is lawless, and filled with groups of raiders and bandits (also classy places like a town called Glory Hole). E and Treadwell navigate these dangers all in the efforts of reuniting Treadwell with his stupid blonde floozybot. Their biggest obstacle comes in the form of Lester, a man who leads his own enclave of lunatics in the desert, and is all too willing to kill people who cross him... or cross his path even, this guy's clearly been out in the sun too long. Also one of his cronies is Robert Z'Dar, the strangest looking man to ever be sort of famous. His face looks like a giant rock, only made out of disgusting man fat.

I also run on a tiny disk.

That's not important though, what's really important is that this movie is totally ridiculous. In the same vein and spirit as films like Mad Max, Cherry 2000 is full of absolutely over-the-top moments, involving in particular a scene where E and Treadwell descend into a dam while people are shooting RPGs at them, and they respond by firing rockets and machine guns back. Also when I say descend I mean "get dangled into a drain spout while balancing on the front of E's mustang". In general, while Treadwell is no slouch (it is hinted that he was in the army at one point) it is most important to note that E is an almost completely unflappable badass, and generally doesn't need her car full of killing implements to mess shit up. Those are just an added bonus, allowing her to really kill everyone, which she does 100%. There is also obviously lots of the sexiness, though I wouldn't say there's lots of sex. It's just very sexualized, because that's part of being edgy in the 80s.

She looks kind of on the fence about shooting someone.

Cherry 2000 has a sort of niche following, in part because it is a silly movie from the 80s, but I think mostly because it was never released theatrically. If it had I honestly think that it wouldn't enjoyed a much larger following and lasting success, the way some other dystopian/post-apocalyptic films have (like say Mad Max for instance, that shares a lot of setting in common with this movie). It's unfortunate that Orion was so totally spineless in their release, now you have to just settle for getting this movie second hand from me. Is it a good movie? That seems like it might be a little bit of an overstatement. I think that if you aren't taking it too seriously, that Cherry 2000 is kind of an awesome movie to watch, when considered within its genre. Just understand what kind of movie you're signing up for, and don't expect a deep commentary on the state of the union or anything. This movie also marks the only thing Melanie Griffith did that I ever gave a crap about, ever ever ever.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

That's all I've got for today! I've been packing away a variety of thoroughly unimpressive movies, but I'm trying to break them up with at least sort of okay movies, so that you don't overdose on my hate. That being said, I really need to see 47 Ronin.