Italy had Pasolini. Germany had Fassbinder. Spain has Almodovar, but there was a time when he was daring to go that extra mile and rip the concept of what a movie should be to shreds, before he became a respected director and has gone to mainstream yet high quality films. England had Jarman. We still have John Waters, and thanks to him, we can enjoy the "Hunh?" kind of movie that PINK FLAMINGOS is.
Give an extremely subversive, creative person enough freedom of expression and a camera and you will have a bona fide movie director. Way back in a time before the advent of YouTube and viral videos, you had those people who genuinely, despite their almost nonexistent academic knowledge of cinema per compounded many times over by this genius that, like the fire which burns Divine's trailer down, raged through their finished product, had something special -- something indescribable, indefinable -- that made them automatic cult figures and icons-to-be for an entire future generation.
It didn't make them a threat to the movie industry and it doesn't now. Such people, like Luis Bunuel back in 1929 when he did UN CHIEN ANDALOU, live in their own Universe and It moves at its own pace. John Waters could hardly be called anything at all: his movie, which premiered nearly 35 years ago, was greeted with dazed reaction. Some called it the best thing since CRIES AND WHISPERS. Some called it trash. Pure filth. People didn't really know what to make of it then, and even now, when purportedly we've come a long way, it stands on its own pedestal, defies explanation, defies a rating, and shrieks out its outrageousness by ways of the furious persona of Divine who does things that can only be summarized in one word: gasp.
What plot there is, well, here it goes: Babs Johnson (Divine), also known to tabloids as the "Filthiest Person Alive" lives in a trailer outside Baltimore with her son/lover Cracker and her daughter Cotton. Another couple, the Marbles, have plans of becoming themselves the "Filthiest People Alive". They run an illegal baby ring for lesbians via two kidnapped girls via the man servant who gets them pregnant. Once the Marbles burn Babs' trailer down, Babs vows revenge. Then she takes it just a little bit farther up the scale, and what happens later has to be seen to be believed.
Does it aim to shock? Well, for those who like their movies classy and elegant, this one will probably kill their party. It features some of the most bizarre scenes ever filmed, and there is that one moment right at the end when Divine decides it would be rather fun to do something unspeakable with what comes out of a small dog's rear end. The music John Waters uses is so jarringly out of place that it makes the scene insane, and it will take a strong stomach and willpower not to scream (in equal parts laughter and disgust) at how "there" the movie goes.
Now, here is the hard part: can I recommend PINK FLAMINGOS? I would have to say yes, because it's become a part of outrageous cinema. Its documentary, home-movies style is a main part of its charm: it makes a complete mess of a movie brilliant. Even when it touches certain themes best left for the Marquis de Sade (such as coprophagia, rape, incest, dismemberment, voyeurism, bestiality) it does so in such a balls-out hysterical way it's impossible to take it seriously. All anyone can do is watch in awe, and see the man who in later years became tamer and went mainstream with HAIRSPRAY, who once was as punk as Sid Vicious. This is as hardcore as hardcore gets for Waters. And that is a compliment.
Give an extremely subversive, creative person enough freedom of expression and a camera and you will have a bona fide movie director. Way back in a time before the advent of YouTube and viral videos, you had those people who genuinely, despite their almost nonexistent academic knowledge of cinema per compounded many times over by this genius that, like the fire which burns Divine's trailer down, raged through their finished product, had something special -- something indescribable, indefinable -- that made them automatic cult figures and icons-to-be for an entire future generation.
It didn't make them a threat to the movie industry and it doesn't now. Such people, like Luis Bunuel back in 1929 when he did UN CHIEN ANDALOU, live in their own Universe and It moves at its own pace. John Waters could hardly be called anything at all: his movie, which premiered nearly 35 years ago, was greeted with dazed reaction. Some called it the best thing since CRIES AND WHISPERS. Some called it trash. Pure filth. People didn't really know what to make of it then, and even now, when purportedly we've come a long way, it stands on its own pedestal, defies explanation, defies a rating, and shrieks out its outrageousness by ways of the furious persona of Divine who does things that can only be summarized in one word: gasp.
What plot there is, well, here it goes: Babs Johnson (Divine), also known to tabloids as the "Filthiest Person Alive" lives in a trailer outside Baltimore with her son/lover Cracker and her daughter Cotton. Another couple, the Marbles, have plans of becoming themselves the "Filthiest People Alive". They run an illegal baby ring for lesbians via two kidnapped girls via the man servant who gets them pregnant. Once the Marbles burn Babs' trailer down, Babs vows revenge. Then she takes it just a little bit farther up the scale, and what happens later has to be seen to be believed.
Does it aim to shock? Well, for those who like their movies classy and elegant, this one will probably kill their party. It features some of the most bizarre scenes ever filmed, and there is that one moment right at the end when Divine decides it would be rather fun to do something unspeakable with what comes out of a small dog's rear end. The music John Waters uses is so jarringly out of place that it makes the scene insane, and it will take a strong stomach and willpower not to scream (in equal parts laughter and disgust) at how "there" the movie goes.
Now, here is the hard part: can I recommend PINK FLAMINGOS? I would have to say yes, because it's become a part of outrageous cinema. Its documentary, home-movies style is a main part of its charm: it makes a complete mess of a movie brilliant. Even when it touches certain themes best left for the Marquis de Sade (such as coprophagia, rape, incest, dismemberment, voyeurism, bestiality) it does so in such a balls-out hysterical way it's impossible to take it seriously. All anyone can do is watch in awe, and see the man who in later years became tamer and went mainstream with HAIRSPRAY, who once was as punk as Sid Vicious. This is as hardcore as hardcore gets for Waters. And that is a compliment.