Fall Time is an incredibly absurd crime drama that fails on most levels. David Arquette, Jason London, and Jonah Blechman star as three teenage lads who decide to play a prank on the grownups in their boring 1950s backwoods town. Normal, run of the mill teens would TP town hall, put itching powder in the school principal's undergarments, or short sheet each others beds. These bright sparks decide to stage a phony assassination outside the local bank, where, just by chance, two real cons (Mickey Rourke, who phones in his performance, and Stephen Baldwin) are about to hold up the joint. The prank and the robbery go the way of a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup ("you got your practical joke in my two-bit heist!" "No, you got your two-bit heist in my practical joke!") and mayhem, torture, gunplay, and a homo-erotic subplot take us the rest of the way. Though someone clearly spent a lot of time making sure the period details were right, someone else--presumably screenwriters Steve Alden and Paul Skemp-- larded their absurd story with too many handy dandy coinkidinks. The film also suffers from a portentous score from composer Hummie Mann, which elevates the final scene--involving a fresh baked pie from good ol' Mom--to the overdone levels of a Richard Harris and Jimmy Webb collaboration. Fall Time also features the world's least believable sex scene (involving Sheryl Lee). This is one of those American indies that thinks it's being deep, but merely buries itself in pretentious tomfoolery.
