Flipside Movie Emporium

[matt header]

What do you folks think of John Waters? A series of his films is playing currently at the UWM Union Cinema, and I was treated to him for the first time last night with his 1977 circus of the bizarre Desperate Living.

The movie's not uninteresting, especially considered thematically: it has a satire of class values (especially stiffly proper upper middle class suburbia) and a somewhat nihilistic tale of political corruption (he doesn't seem to consider any sort of privileged establishment as even remotely beneficial). But the sly irony that he tries to inject is overshadowed (smothered, really) by his desperate grotesquerie: I can't bring myself to become intrigued by a movie that contains (here goes to checklist) cannibalism, rabies, roadkill, lesbianism, sex change operations, manually-done castrations, the gouging of eyes, smothering in dog food, and rampant nudity, often of obese people.

I have rarely been a fan of ironic entertainment - that which is "so bad it's good" - and that's exactly what this seems to be. Its cheap production values and hammy unacting apparently are supposed to add to the raucous, anarchic tone; but I was more annoyed than entertained by the whole proceeding, not necessarily by the extreme indecency, but with the brash, look, ma, I'm being crude! juvenility with which the movie is played.

Then again, this was my first Waters film, and perhaps I just haven't grown accustomed to his sense of humor. Any fans? Non-fans?

[beltmann]

[the night watchman]

Actually, since Waters has gone "legit" I'm not so interested in his movies anymore. I really do like his earlier stuff, though.
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"If you're talking about censorship, and what things should be shown and what things shouldn't be shown, I've said that as an artist you have no social responsibility whatsoever."

-David Cronenberg

[Fred C. Dobbs]

I just don't "get" John Waters. And I absolutely despise Hairspray.
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"Pino, fuck you, fuck your fuckin' pizza, and fuck Frank Sinatra."

[Dr Giggles]

Anyone seen Pink Flamingoes?

It was screening here for one night only,

and I couldnt get down there to see it.
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walking on air, up from the wheelchair,

I'll find the suicide, that I deserve.

[Monkeypox]

Add me to the list of people who don't particularly care for John Waters.
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Rattlesnake's Texas Cobra, you sonofabitch!