Cherry, Harry & Raquel! (1970) Russ Meyer

Harry (a corrupt sheriff) and his Chicano deputy hunt an Apache who is about to go to the authorities with the news Harry is smuggling marijuana. Harry makes love to Raquel (a prostitute) and Cherry (a nurse). The women also has an erotic encounter between themselves. Harry’s boss gets it off with Raquel and Cherry, too. Uschi Digard romps around the desert naked.

Russ Meyer is a genius at cutting films. And from other examples of his work you can tell he had the whole multi, jump cut vision in his head. Shooting plenty of coverage to get the whole hyper-active, ceaselessly interesting story told. But Cherry, Harry and Raquel was completely shot when the lab ruined over half the footage. Meyer was forced to improvise and Uschi Digart became the scene padding “Muse”. The afterword narration becomes a completely overboard retelling of the whole movie. But for all those sad concessions to losing whatever Meyer might have made of this story, it’s one of my favorites. Charles Napier absolutely rules. He must have double the muscles in his forehead and scalp than the ordinary mortal as evidenced by some of the mugging he does in this flick. Meyer’s kinetic film cutting was far ahead of it’s time. The climactic final shoot out is just bloody and macho and totally hilarious stuff.

Cherry, Harry & Raquel! (1970)