![]() I first became aware of John Waters around the time that the movie "Hairspray" premiered. I'd just started my first serious job out of college and was in the habit of watching Good Morning America while getting ready for work. One morning, prim little Joan Lunden was interviewing John Waters and Divine. I had no idea who they were at the time. They both looked perfectly respectable in their suits and ties. Neither had I recalled hearing anything about a movie called "Hairspray." I didn't take much notice of the program, focusing instead on my bowl of Peanut Butter Crunch. Then I heard Joan ask them, "Hairspray is rated PG, but you two are better known for making trashy, x-rated cult films. What's that all about?" I didn't even listen to John Waters' response. I was stuck on "trashy, x-rated cult films." At the time I had no specific affinity for filth, but I'd always had a keen interest in the outrageous. It was something I wanted to cultivate within myself. About the only cult film I'd ever seen was Rocky Horror. I needed to expand my horizons.
Now I was on a mission to see his other films. I didn't even know the names of any of them, let alone if I'd be able to find them on video tape. I went to a big music/video chain store and asked the girl behind the video counter to give me a price list of all titles with John Waters as director. I figured she could punch it up and give me a hard copy, but she started writing them down by hand, as if off the top of her head. "You know them all by heart?" I asked. "Well," she said as she pulled out a video guide, "not all of them." I was surprised that this clean-cut nice-looking young woman was up on all these trash cult films. I told her about how I was new to the scene and couldn't wait to see all these movies. It turned out that they could order most of these videos, but that the prices were really high. She whispered in my ear that there was a small independent video store just up the road that had a Cult Films rack, and that most if not all of these titles should be there. I was impressed that she actually referred me to a competitor. I made my way up to the video store she mentioned, and was delighted to find their Cult Films rack. There was a wealth of material there for me to discover and explore. But I stayed on mission and focused only on the John Waters tapes. The first one I rented was "Pink Flamingos." The little old lady behind the counter was all smiles until she saw the title of the video I was renting. Her eyes bulged a little bit as she looked at me. "This is a *strange* movie," she said as she shook her head.
After seeing the classic "Pink Flamingos" I decided to go in chronological order. I saw "Mondo Trasho" and "Multiple Maniacs." Between the two I liked "Mondo Trasho" less simply because there was no dialog and it got kind of boring after a while. But I also thought that both had very meandering plots that didn't really keep my attention.
By this time Waters had foregone the trash and obscenity of his earlier works and replaced it with camp and irony. All his earlier works employed copious amounts of camp and irony, but now it was center stage, and it was more pure and innocent. I felt that it worked marvelously for "Hairspray."
Pretty early on it was clear that this movie would be a musical. Where "Hairspray" had been musical in nature, what with the teen dance setting, this film was a traditional musical where the cast actually broke into song and dance numbers. The story was about a misunderstood bad boy, and the good girl who developed a crush on him and was introduced to his edgy world. That had a certain innocence and charm to it, but let's face it. It's been done. What heretofore had impressed me most about John Waters' work was its uncompromising and almost incomprehensible originality. The "Cry Baby" story was borderline cliché. Perhaps Waters had intended it to be a parody, or "in the spirit of" the way that Rocky Horror was effectively in homage of all the old B movies. All I knew was that it didn't really interest me. In one way I found the cast to be very interesting. Johnny Depp was an interesting and prophetic choice. At the time he was really only known for "21 Jump Street" but he immediately followed up "Cry Baby" with Tim Burton's "Edward Scissorfingers" and the rest is history. Also notable were porn star Tracy Lords, rock star Iggy Pop, and Warhol veteran Joe Dallesandro. Those were all good choices. But beyond that, Waters' cadre of off-color characters seemed to be a pale shadow of the good old Edith Massey days. Ultimately I have to say that the whole movie was a disappointment.
I had an idea where Waters was coming from with the story. I knew he had an unusual interest in crime, and I assume he thought it would be fun to have a typical suburban mother who became a serial killer. As the movie played out I found it to be rife with irony, there was some graphic gore, and there were plenty of funny moments, but it didn't really impress me. It was unusual. It was off-color. It was original. But it wasn't outrageous. It wasn't shocking. It wasn't memorable. In my opinion, it didn't measure up.
Beyond that, it was hard to put my finger on what was missing. "Hairspray" was able to impress me without employing trashy, filthy, obscenity, so it wasn't that. It seemed like all the pieces were in place, but the whole wasn't exceeding the sum of the parts. It wasn't bad, really. It just wasn't good. At least it wasn't the kind of good that I had come to expect from John Waters. His films used to grab me by the balls and wouldn't let go. I can't help but notice that the last Waters movie I liked was "Hairspray," which was also the last movie in which Divine appeared. I am not suggesting that it is the absence of Divine exactly that I feel is missing. But Divine was Waters' muse. He was his inspiration. And if I had to sum up what I felt the problem was with Waters' subsequent movies, I would have to say that they had become uninspired. "Cecil B. DeMented" was the fist John Waters film that I actually disliked. I've only seen it once, and that was a long time ago, so it's difficult to cite specifics. I just remember that I found the pace to be even more rushed than "Pecker," I didn't really find it to be particularly funny, and it was basically just not entertaining to me. Frankly I found it to be annoying, and while I was watching it I pretty much couldn't wait for it to end. I always hold out hope that I'll like the next John Waters film. At the time of this writing I have not yet seen "A Dirty Shame," but early indications are encouraging. But even if I never like another one of his movies, I still like him. I like to hear him in interviews. I applaud what he stands for. And I revere him as a model of taking the back door into movie making. He didn't march into Hollywood and start sending out screenplays. He never succumbed to the will of focus groups. He did his own thing, and he's still doing his own thing. It doesn't matter one bit if I like his work or not. What's important is that he's still doing it, and that he can still get his movies made. |
![]() There Was DIVINE If you love outrageousness, then you gotta love Divine. I mean... just look at him. The body. The clothes. The hair. The makeup. The attitude. He is in every way the physical embodiment of "outrageous." He was absolutely, positively, one-of-a-kind. There'll never be another one like him.
In his tell-all book "Not Simply Divine," long-time friend and manager Bernard Jay painted a different picture of the Divine he knew off camera. He described Divine as "anti-social" in the clinical sense. Divine did not concern himself with conventional social niceties or things like punctuality. Also, Divine suffered from sleep apnea, which left him exhausted all the time. He would fall asleep in any place at any time, and his apnea caused him to gurgle, choke, and snore while he was sleeping. This made him rather unpleasant to be around, especially on planes and in cars. Divine loved to spend money, but he didn't really care whether he had any to spend or not. This left him constantly broke and made it difficult to do things like maintain a steady residence. Divine also did a couple movies other than John Waters projects. He appeared in "Lust In The Dust," which was basically a cheesy Waters rip-off. He also appeared in the Alan Rudolph film "Trouble In Mind" starring Kris Kristofferson. I found the movie to be dreadfully slow-paced and boring, but Divine did an okay job. The interesting thing was he played a male character for once. He was also being considered for a recurring role on the Fox program "Married With Children" where he'd play Crazy Uncle Otto. Again, this would have been a male role, and it would have catapulted him to everyday fame and notoriety. Alas, Divine passed away just as the Fox deal was coming together. He did not succumb to booze, drugs, or disease. It was the sleep apnea that got him. One night he literally suffocated as he slept. The real tragedy was that the condition was 100% treatable. He didn't need to die. His loss was a tragedy of epic proportions. It leaves fans like me wondering what amazing things he would have achieved, and would still be achieving. |
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