Ripe (1996) User Reviews

Disturbing Look At Two Damaged Young Girls.

[jehaccess6 · 5/10 · 15 December 2008]

I have watched this film several times, it never fails to creep me out. The film explores the lives of two pubescent girls who have never experienced a normal life. As the father of two grown daughters, I squirm at the film's brief glimpses into their demented home life. If the parents had not been killed in a car crash, their children may well have turned on them.

For reasons left unexplained, the two girls determine to leave their unidentified home state for Kentucky; after surviving a car crash that kills their parents.

The two girls are fraternal twins, and could hardly be more different. Rosie is the more aggressive and intelligent of the twins. She is filled with rage at her dead father and that rage is going to find an outlet when some man offends her. Violet is the more passive and naive of the two girls. She is more advanced into puberty than her sister and is really vulnerable to the first man who will treat her better than her abusive father.

When the two girls stow away in the back of a pickup truck, they land in the home of an itinerant grounds keeper on an Army Post. The film was probably using an abandoned Army Post for these location shots. No operational Army Post would become so decrepit if the commanding officer hoped to have a successful career. The supposedly authentic military vehicles were really a hoot to see. I doubt that many of them would even run.

The film soldiers on this Post are really homo erotic in their behavior. I suppose this tendency would pass muster in Hollywood, but never in the real Army. There is only one officer on this post and only one mid-level NCO. The budget limitations on this film really showed in the lack of anything resembling a real command structure.

The two girls set up what passes for housekeeping in their limited experience. They sleep in their undies on sofa cushions on the living room floor of the shack that serves as living quarters for the grounds keeper. It took no mental giant to see that eventually the grounds keeper would wind up sleeping with one or both of these vulnerable young girls.

The two girls start to drift apart when their environment is no longer as hostile as their horrible home life. Violet starts to make friends with the grounds keeper she works with daily. He is obviously responding emotionally to her feminine charms and that is very appealing to her developing sexuality. Rosie is enraged with both the grounds keeper and her sister as the formerly united front breaks down.

The plot has the two girls attending a dance as supposed dates for the grounds keeper. They somehow came up with dresses that could pass muster for this event despite having been out on the road without anything more than the clothes on their backs. Obviously, some shopping never shown in the film would have been necessary to outfit the twins.

Well, the film ends as Rosie maneuvers the grounds keeper into a vulnerable situation where she can murder him. Violet reacts by breaking the last bond with her sister and skipping out with the money stolen from the dead grounds keeper. My skin crawled as the abandoned Rosie hums a little tune as she plays Russian Roulette with the revolver she used to kill the grounds keeper.

I suppose that I wanted to see the twins recover from their damaged childhood and live worthwhile lives. The eventual fate of Violet is left a blank. Rosie most likely commits suicide. Sadly, that happens in real life. This film really got to me despite its production flaws and limited budget. I really was yelling for Rosie to put down the gun as the film credits started rolling. This film would not be a wise choice for young children for obvious reasons.

Bad Script, Pointless Story

[atlasmb · 4/10 · 21 November 2013]

Ripe is a story about two 14-year-old sisters who, in their immature view of the world, strike out for Kentucky because they think for some reason it's a beautiful place where life is easy. On their way, they get sidetracked and decide to stay a while at a derelict army base that bears no resemblance to any base I have ever seen. There is no security and no discipline.

The girls live with a long-haired guy whose job, it seems, is to run errands for the base.

The best part of this film is the acting by the two lead actresses. Unfortunately the characters they play have no redeeming features (nor does any other character). They are thieves with a penchant for violence. The writer/director makes it clear in the first scenes that violence is a part of their natures. Their only allegiance is to each other, and that allegiance is at risk as they grow up and they discover an outside world.

The main problem with the film is the writing. The film does not have a viewpoint, it just seems to record happenings, which are often bizarre. Whenever one of the two main characters has an opportunity to learn something, the story thwarts that possibility--unless you think that learning to shoot a gun is a significant learning experience.

I found the film emotionally flat and disappointingly pointless.

overripe

[fairygirl411 · 4/10 · 24 June 2002]

Thinly-cloaked retelling of the Garden-of-Eden story -- nothing new, nothing shocking, although I feel that that is what the filmmakers were going for. The idea is trite. Strong performance from Daisy Eagan, that's about it. I believed she was 13, and I was interested in her character. The rest left me cold.

under-appreciated film *SPOILER*

[b-severson · 19 September 2004]

C'mon people! Give the director a break. This film ain't so bad. In fact, I think it is one of the better coming-of-age films I've seen. Despite some areas of imperfection, are the technicalities that important? Who cares if some pieces of the plot are questionable...the performances are heartfelt and strong. I was especially impressed with Daisy Eagan's performance as Rosie, the bitter and rejected twin of Violet, played by Monica Keena. After their parents die in an accident, Rosie and Violet head to Kentucky, where they plan to start over. On the way, they hitch a ride to an army base where they meet Pete (Gordon Currie), a loner who is living on the base. He eventually decides to let them live with him temporarily while they work on the base to earn money for their trip. Throughout the film, Rosie and Violet become progressively more detached from one another, physically and emotionally. Violet, the prettier and more sexually aggressive of the two, develops a crush on Pete, while her sister discovers a fascination with guns after meeting Ken (Ron Brice), an army official working on the base. When Rosie discovers that Violet has lost her virginity to Pete, she becomes dangerously jealous. She sees Pete as a threat to the bond that she and Violet share as sisters and devises a plan to get rid of him. The ending will shock and amaze you. It is by far one of the most devastating conclusions although it is genuinely real. This film is an excellent examination of how bonds between siblings are corrupted by the natural and inevitable events that shape sexual maturity.

Ridiculous coming of age which is more ridiculous because we actually know Mo

[ola201 · 2/10 · 23 January 2010]

This is one of a rarity of movies, where instead of a bowl of popcorn one should watch it with a bottle of vodka. To be completely honest we are a group of people who actually know the man, Mo Ogrodnik, and decided to drink ourselves stupid to this film.

The cinematic aspect of Wolfgang Something's photography seems to have left out both close-ups and breasts. Mo and Wolfgang's collaborative effort revealed the passion of the two actresses, plastic peens holding passion. There's also beetle banging. As Violet would have put it: "This (plastic peen) goes up your butt". The rat porn and subsequent rat smashing is awesome.

Alright. So if you are still reading, let us explain who we are. Mo Ogrodnik teaches at NYU and we are a group of her students, who, finishing a film class with her, decided to get poop- faced and watch here directorial debut. She also wrote Uptown Girls. I can't tell you how much that's been hammered into our skulls. So this movie is quite the experience. At the very bottom of this post will be a drinking game we created for this movie.

About 13 minutes into this game, none of us could see straight. The sheer amount of Dido's in the first thirty minutes created enough reasons to drink to pacify an elephant.There was something secretly pleasurable about seeing two underage girls hit on a Kurt Cobain lookalike with absolutely no context, save for his mysterious scene at the convenience store where he was oh-so-naturally reading a local newspaper. Because that's what we all do. The heart-shaped glasses were delightfully derivative of Lolita. And something about that provocative scene of the nude chin-up boy suggests the director's history of homosexual pornographic experiments. We wish we were kidding.

Enough intellectual contemplation. ON TO THE DRINKING GAME! This will ensure that the viewing experience is a positive one. It's very simple, and very likely to send at least one member of your party to immediate care.

The Mo Ogrodnik/Ripe Drinking Game: 1. Every time you see anything related to pornography, take a drink. 2. Every time you see auteur Mo Ogrodnik's name appear, take a drink. 3. Sex. 4. (plastic peen) require two drinks. 5. Any time somebody points a gun at another character, take a drink. -At this point you will probably need to refill/pee pee any remaining sobriety from your body.- 6. Any time there is blood (INCLUDING "LADY BLOOD"), please take a sip! 7. The underused hula-hoop girl requires one drink per second. 8. Gratuitous use of the "magic black man" requires one drink. 9. If you can't figure out the through-line, KEEP DRINKING, Beyotch. 10. Whenever you are able to predict a line, take a drink. Trust us. It's easy.

That's it, internet! Keep drinking, and try not to get riped.

-Hawaiian Smirnoff Punch, Jr.

Just good enough to be awful.

[=G= · 3/10 · 6 October 2001]

"Ripe" is one of those awful indies which manages to get into circulation and give indies a bad name. Telling a stupidly incongruous tale of pubescent twin sisters who crawl from a firey car crash which kills their parents and then hit the road while happily shoplifting, making goo-goo eyes at some guy, and ending up on an Army post so dilapidated no Army would want it (yeah, right!). An apparent attempt at a coming of age flick, "Ripe" is an almost complete loser which wanders aimlessly as the players drift in and out of character finally ending clumsily with nary a shred of credibility to be found anywhere. Not recommended for anyone.

A really bad movie

[Spider-36 · 3/10 · 16 June 2001]

This movie was, in one word, terrible. It was boring, predictable, and downright creepy. I kept waiting for it to end and when it did, I was horrified. The ending left a bad taste in my mouth, to say the least. My advice to anyone interested in movies about budding female sexuality: stay away from this movie. Movies like this give classics like Lolita a bad name.

Dark fantasy

[sourpussss · 7/10 · 7 November 2017]

Reading reviews on this site is often a head scratcher. Save for one boisterous post by the director's students (caustically unimpressed and self-amused), nearly all seem to hold this gently dark fable in breach of some law of realism. When I saw this in a theater in the 90s it seemed immediately clear that the film was not a true life tale but a languid fantasy of girls on the run. How often are 14 year old girls allowed to caper through a store shoplifting in front of a mute store owner, or hide out in plain site at a weedy army base where the soldiers do little but loll about and roughhouse? An initial stab at a voice-over betrays the girls' naive perspective, while their hi jinx are never checked even when one breaks into a moldering armory and is caught stealing a gun by an MP.

This isn't realism, but it also isn't a pat "flowering of early womanhood" scenario a la Man In The Moon, and has more to offer than a somewhat similar indie feature from the same period, Manny and Lo. The independently financed boom of 80s and 90s American film was experimental in only the mildest sense, but it did open the door to perspectives that before only occupied the edges of the frame. Little of it holds a candle to the seismic shift of the previous two decades (or work coming out of Asia at the time). But seldom have young women been shown wandering through a landscape, experimenting with their sensual impulses and liberty, with so few brutal consequences to themselves. In that respect, Ripe has more in common with countless films of boys on the loose.

Also confused (and confusing) in the reporting here is that the director is a woman, not a man, which may account for the mostly sensitive handling of the young leads, who are never fully exposed even during sex scenes. The performances are uneven, the writing is mostly challenging only in conception. Still, this one of those rare films that may appeal to few but has more than enough to offer if one can manage to hold still and let it slowly, steadily sway into your subconscious.

Not very good... in any sense.

[Wood-20 · 1/10 · 24 June 2002]

This movie did attempt to capture the naive idealism that many young teenaged girls have for fun, friendship, escape, danger, sex, maturity, etc. The problem was that it failed to establish these things on every single level; which is why it failed to build a decent story around them. I couldn't follow the point of any part of this story, nor any reason why I should care.

This movie is not an exploration into pedophilia at all. It's basically about a girl being in love with her sister, and her sister being in love with the idea of "men". While the latter tries out her love of men, the former tries to win her sister back by "getting even".

The plot is weak, the characters are weak, and the reality of it all was similar to an amateur porn filmmaker (without the sexual substance).

a pedo-erotic version of the apple dumpling gang

[Protocult · 4/10 · 10 April 2003]

Uninspired, pretty much all around. The only exceptions were a couple emotional scenes with Keena (Violet), with whose performance I was pleasantly surprised and occasionally moved. Beyond that, it ended up being little more than a bad COA flick.

A true jewel...

[mk723 · 9/10 · 24 May 2000]

This is one of the first films to really move me in a long time. The subjects touched on in the film, including the sexuality and sibling relationships are very true to life. A non-teen might not be able to quite relate to the story that well, but the story is universal (in a slightly extreme way). This film reached deep into the heart of two very real teenage girls, and told a very real story. I believe that it deserves some kudos.

Terrible, terrible, terrible.

[MaximumCheese · 1/10 · 13 June 2009]

There are so many things wrong with this movie I don't even know where to begin. The story is not cohesive AT ALL. I guarantee that five minutes into the movie the average viewer will be scratching his/her head in confusion.

Here's what I remember of the movie before I was bored into unconsciousness: A quasi-abusive dad chases some pre-teen sisters through a house but turns out to be not that abusive after all. In the next scene, the girls are about 15. They're driving with their parents and hit a deer. The deer must have been explosive because their car blows up, one sister drags the other from the burning wreckage. Then, the girls are drifting in a boat on a lake and make a huge plan to go to Kentucky (??) and start a new life. In the very next scene, the girls are hitchhiking toward a military base. And what a military base it is. Actually, it's more like a hog farm converted to look like a military base with plenty of confused extras playing "soldiers." The base commander's office is particularly awesome because there are random things like an AK-47 hanging on the wall and a drill sergeant hat mounted to a plaque (????) so the audience is sure to know that this is a military guy's office. Then some random dude pushing a motorcycle shows up and the base commander orders him to go "into town" to buy some porn mags, and to make sure the soldiers don't think that he's on the "pink team." So our character takes a pickup converted to look like an army truck "to town" and loads up a box from a nondescript "book store" with a blowup doll by the front door. The girls hide in the guy's truck when he stops to gas up, and look through the porn stash to find items inside like the "anal invader." I guess that's enough of the plot to scare most people away. Plot aside, the sound quality is terrible and the movie is full of cheesy attempts at symbolism, like a radio preacher talking about forbidden fruit during the scene where the "slutty" sister meets the main character for the first time, or how the camera lingers way too long on certain shots to try to convey a "message".

If you ever see this for sale or rent or whatever, stay away. It's not worth the money in either case.

positive comments

[sdrogue · 16 August 2002]

as the director says, coming of age movies are so laced with sweetness and lace that you would think puberty for girls was a picnic (not verbatim)...this movie shows the confusion and frustration that young girls go through when dealing with the fact they may look, act, and be able to feel older, but in actuality are still just little girls. Its a classic case of wrong time, wrong place for them. The men in this movie, are evil just from being opportunistic to the girls. While the movie is intense in several parts, I think the fact the girls are actually in the right age groups as the characters really throws me for a loop. Casting them was daring and edgy, and about time to do something like that... nobody is right in this film, nobody wins, and everyone loses something... Q

Eh, it's just weird, kinda Gross

[Beyondtherain · 5/10 · 11 February 2020]

This film probably tried to cash in off 1995 "KIDS" except, these main girls, (the actual actors) are 16-17? Kissing 28-30 year olds? And I couldn't follow no sort of story at all... KIDS was made by a Kid and written by a kid at the time of it's production... This film is adults on kids... Which to me, is weird, how was this allowed? The girls are literally 16 touching on men twice their age...what I can say is it makes me uncomfortable and cringe. Not in a good way.

a masterpiece of tension

[SkyAngel1728 · 10/10 · 6 April 2003]

One of the hallmarks of pacing in a movie is to either shock the audience by pulling aplot twist from nowhere. or reveal the way things are headed early on. and keep the audience in suspence about when and how something will happen. The latter is handled beautifully in Ripe as two girls find out just how mush love. sex and death can be intertwined. The director establishes early on that the groundskeeper will tear a rift between the two girls, which will lead to one of them killing him. The way this movie is paced makes this completely agonizing. Even better. the director also gives us a lot of carefree. hilarious moments to counter the tension. Once the trigger is pulled. there is no telling what might happen to the girls, the aftermath is up for grabs, which the director handles brilliantly.

Fairly amateurish "thriller" based on a true story

[d_fienberg · 2 November 2000]

There's no rule that says that true events necessarily seem real on screen. It's actually probably more difficult to make a realistic fictional film than to translate a tragic, but true, event to film. Mo Ogrodnik experiences this problem with his first fictional film, 1996's Ripe.

Based on an apparently true story of two fourteen year old girls who survive a car crash which kills their parents, Ripe is ostensibly about the bond between sisters and their different ways of dealing with the onset of adolescence. Both physically mature, the two girls run away from the accident and find residence at a military base, where they find a home with a long-haired biker. Out of tragedy comes further tragedy.

As evidenced by the film's poster (featuring Monica Keena's nymphet Violet biting into an apple), Ogrodnik, who got his start making documentaries, seems to think he has a provocative story of innocence lost and a fall from grace. The problem is that what he really has is a connection of completely unmotivated actions featuring a string of characters who are completely without depth. Keena's Violet is becoming interested in sex. Daisy Eagen's Rose is becoming interested in Violence. And Peter, the man who takes them in, is basically just there. He has no past and no dialogue to give any sense at all of who he is.

I guess the film has a nice look. Wolfgang Held's cinematography calls to mind the empty spaces and spare setting of Badlands, a slightly similar kinda-true story of innocence and violence. But the style is to service of nothing. The plot can't move because everything that happens either seems unbearably tacky (every scene involving the soldiers at the base is like a bad copy of every basic training movie ever made, from Biloxi Blues to Full Metal Jacket).

Keena (whose recurring role on Dawson's Creek marks the only time you would have ever seen any member of the cast) and Eagan give decent performances, but it's tough to get involved with the characters' internal lives because of the paucity of closeups. As Peter, Gordon Currie is fairly awful. He's given nothing to do and yet he still comes of only as shrill. He seems neither sympathetic, nor creepy and probably the film would like him to be one or the other. Basically he's a cypher.

Ripe is only marginally provocative and it produces no real emotion. As studies of young sexuality it's inferior to the underrated Adrian Lynne Lolita. And as a story of young girls made old before their time it pales in comparison to Manny and Lo.

I guess I'd probably give it a 3.5 outta 10 because I've certainly seen worse films, but I sure can't think of much to recommend it.

Hilariously kinky adventures of trashy orphan girls.

[chucksbadd · 1 March 2001]

This film, alternately side-splittingly funny and stunningly bizarre,is destined to become a cult classic. It's difficult to decide if the filmmakers were wanting to make a seriocomic social commentary or just indulging a penchant for the outlandish. Either way, this is a movie that must truly be seen to be believed. After two viewings I can't really say whether I like it or dislike it, but I can certainly recommend it to viewers as a film unlike any other. Besides, if it airs on The IFC, it's got have something going for it, right?

Definitely Different, but be prepared!

[Sylvaro · 27 October 2004]

**SPOILERS**

Well, on the whole, this movie was both pretty good, and fairly sad. It centers around 2 fraternal twins, Rose and Violet, age 14. After the death of their abusive parents, they escape on a fantasy-driven voyage across the sticks to salvation in Kentucky?!?! Needless to say, they both discover their sexuality in different ways, (not necessarily realistically, such as 14yr old Violet's first *real* kiss ~AS~ she cleans up after her first period) ending up on an out of hand, rather isolated army base, complete with homoerotic rituals. Staying with a drifter, Violet falls in love with him (above kiss) and her sister becomes upset as she has no place in the world and her only solid link, her sister, is falling for a 30 something drifter, leaving her in the lonely dust. Rose briefly befriends an MP who rescues her from her first (also pedophilic, but this time, just shy of a rape) sexual experience and teaches her to shoot, giving her a gun. Rose eventually kills the drifter. Violet, instead of killing Rose over her lost lover, does a much more damaging thing and leaves, stranding her, alone. The movie ends as Rose fails to kill herself.

Sound cheesy, or unbelievable? Well, I imagine that such a thing is possible in the sticks, when no one else is around. Human nature can sure get us into strange, unorthodox situations. So if you can stretch around some of the abnormal situations the movie offers, you can see through the window it opens. You will look upon a very sad portrait, watching 2 girls, really just kids, trying to run away as they lose everything. This movie is reminiscent of a few other escapist films about young kids in really crummy situations that you might have seen. If you are easily "cheesed out" or creeped out, don't watch this film. Also, this film is only good if you are the type of person who is very good at viewing abstract meaning and the big picture.

Boring and ultimately pointless...

[gallus-2 · 26 April 2000]

After watching Ripe, I'm left feeling cheated of one and one-half hours of my life. The movie gets off to a confusing start, and goes downhill from there. The two young female stars of the film (Monica Keena, Daisy Eagan) are difficult to watch, the sets are hideous, and there is no feeling of genuine chemistry between any of the characters.

As for plot: forget it. The film is comprised primarily of silly episodes that do not serve to develop the characters or their relationships. From the beginning, we see that Rosie (Eagan) is seriously disturbed and dominating and that Violet (Keena) is submissive if slightly more cunning than her tomboy sister. These characters do not change one iota during the course of the film. When the story line isn't bogged down with mind-numbing predictability, it's busy being disgusting - focusing on unsavory body functions.

Perhaps the most irritating facet of this movie is the army base on which most of the action takes place. I understand that the US military has suffered some steep budget cuts over the last seven years, but I doubt that any army base in the nation is as poor-looking or completely lacking in discipline and protocol as the one depicted in this film.

The girl that played Maxine is incredible!

[tim-christy · 24 October 2004]

Wasn't too jazzed with this movie at all, and felt cheated after terrible performances and mediocre writing, however the little girl, Maxine (Candice Love), was absolutely adorable and I hope to see her in future performances. There is real talent there for this cutie. Does anyone know where she's from or if she's done anything else? I hope to see her untapped talent in years to come! Her performance made the whole thing worth watching, and she had but a short part. Does she perhaps have a website? The director has gone on to do some worthwhile screenplays but as far as 'Ripe' is concerned, I hope she will not be directing ever again. This movie gets 2 very enthusiastic thumbs down down.

Total letdown

[crack-4 · 22 July 1999]

This movie was a complete letdown. By looking at the box and reading the back of it, you're expecting this to be somewhat of a skin flick, not so. The only real nudity was a rear shot of an army officer. The storyline for this was also quite stupid. Not to mention boring. I give it 2/10 stars.

This filmmaker is just plain talentless.

[slippersocksmed · 8 June 2003]

This movie is a joke and doesn't even deserve the effort of explaining all the things that it does so terribly. Don't waste your time, it's a joke. And anyone who sees it as brilliant needs to get a life. This isn't art, it gives indies a bad name. Film is an art, and just SHOWING things that are SUPPOSED to say something isn't art. it's how you depict these characters. Mo Ogrodnik shouldn't admit this is hers. But she's actually quite proud of it. Just plain talentless.

They forgot the "T"

[jacksonc · 16 August 1999]

This foul, putrid, puerile, rancid pile of dung should have been called "tripe." They forgot the first "t." If you wanted something entertaining, it was not. If you wanted something erotic, it was not. If you wanted something thought provoking, it was not. If you wanted something nauseating, it was. It was not, however, bad enough to be good...

In a word, icky.

[Mr Mauve · 27 February 1999]

Well, I have to admit I did not finish watching this cringefest - or should I say COULD not? I thought 'The Lover' featuring Jane Marsh was exploitative... But then again, it had nice atmospherics, while 'Ripe' is just fairly flat images meant to shock or create tension which instead nauseate or bore the viewer. This is pretty intense, right? OK, so the issue of pedophilism is touchy, but you can't build a WHOLE movie around it.

Rating : 1/2 * (one half star)