Movie review - "Multiple Maniacs" (1970) ***

 Overshadowed by Pink Flamingos but the vision was fully formed by this one - John Waters freaky friends causing chaos, lots of bitchy lines and insane encounters, melodrama with a twist. Goes too long - really this should be a tight 30 minutes. But it's fun to hang out with Waters and his mates - Mink Stole, Divine, David L, Cookie, Edie. You feel like you're over at their house as they play dress ups.

Script review - "Female Trouble/Desperate Living" by John Waters

 Getting through these audio readings by Waters of his scripts. Both are crime-ish melodramas - like most of these early Waters films he takes a series of wacky characters and haves some way-out exchanges. For me Desperate Living worked better - the insults felt funnier, an "innocent" in a trash town, though Female Trouble is fun too

Script review - "Pink Flamingo" / "Forever Flamingo" by John Waters

 I listened to Waters do an audio version of these. They have similar structure. I enjoyed the first more than the movie - Waters is so fun doing the voices. The second was fine, just repetitious. The cast would've made it work.

Script review - "Hairpray" by John Waters

 Audio version of the script read by Waters himself. Lots of fun, he's an engaging performer, the dialogue is bright. The story of thing is stronger. All Waters' work is political, this is more accessibly political (with integration). But very enjoyable.

Movie review - "Female Trouble" (1974) ***1/2

 John Waters' got his Pink Flamingo gang back for his hugely enjoyable spoof of crime pictures. Divine has the time of her life in the lead role. Plenty of shock and nudity, Divine in a dual role. Hits all the beats - origin story, trial, electric chair.

Movie review - "Trouble in Mind" (1985) **1/2

 Alan Rudolph's success with Choose Me made it a little easier for him to raise finance for his next movie, this neo-noir about a man out of prison (Kris Kristofferson) whose paths cross with a couple (Keith Carradine, Lori Singer).

This is two movies really - a more serious noir, with Kristofferson kicking ass and falling for Singer, and gangsters - and a campier way out one with Carradine having wacky hair and Divine playing a gangster (quite well). The tone isn't quite right it feels inconsistent.

Singer is lovely, Carradine has a ball, Kristofferson isn't bad, Genevieve Bujold feels a little under utilised. The movie doesn't quite work tonally but I enjoyed the love story with Singer and Kristofferson and the violent bits do keep things going.  

Movie review - "Pink Flamingos" (1972) **

 Technically rough. Not much of a story. It dragged. Waters got better at filmmaking later. Retains power to shock and offend - Divine gives her son oral sex (a scene cut when I first saw it), there is rape with chickens. 

It drags in places. Great showmanship. Remarkable collection of grotesques. Plenty of influences. Divine is a genuine star. Edith Massey has magic as does Mink Stole.

Movie review - "Something Wild" (1986) ***1/2

 A film best discovered without knowing too much about it. It ticked all of Jonathan Demme's boxes - love letter to a few actors, stylistic, American underbelly, opportunities for music. Melanie Griffith is wonderful, though in the second half she's very passive. Ray Liotta excellent - ditto Jeff Daniel (I miss those pre blowhard days). Fun cameos from John Sayles and John Waters. Full of quirk and tonal shifts. Like a very good Australian film. Like many of those probably half an hour too long.

Musicals - "Cry Baby" versus "Hairspray"

 Listened to the cast album of Cry Baby - the broadway show. I know it's only going off cast albums but I think I can see why that didn't work and Hairspray did. As a musical that is - I prefer Cry Baby as a film. But it doesn't have a lot of story - the film runs out as is. Also the characters are less vivid - Johnny Depp and Amy Locane are a solid centre, and there's decent villains (the smarmy guy, the fake pregnancy girl) but the others are more a galaxy of types - Hatchet Face, Ricki Lake.

Compare Hairspray - it's got the overweight girl, and her mum and geeky dad, and her best friend and the friend's religious nutter mom, and the cute guy and bitch girl and her mum, and the black singer, and the black boyfriend. Hairspray has a natural playground - the Corny Collins show - and is about two big issues: treatment of fat people and treatment of blacks. There's more to work with. Cry Baby doesn't have these. It's about outsiders.

Also I think the music in the film is better than Broadway. It was rock a billy, catchy, fun, The musical music feels more generic.

Movie review - "Hairspray" (2007) **** (re-watching)

 Watching this and comparing my old notes my views hadn't changed - opening number could've used more dancing, the James Marsden character is underutilised, it slows when it's about the adults, it's glorious and fun with a great heart.

I was thinking of while watching it that somewhere out there someone was tweeting "white saviour" ruining everyone's good time.

But it's fun. So fun. I wish Hollywood would make more musicals.

Book review - "Liarmouth" by John Waters (2022)

 Waters' first novel is as close as we're going to get to a Divine film these days - it's the tale of a crime spree by Martha, a chronic liar, which involves a man obssessed with her, her daughter and various other nutballs. Plenty of filth and deviancy some of it quite funny - it is pure Waters. I wanted a little more plot and variation and got tired after a while. A better short story.

Book review - "Mr Know It All" by John Waters

Really lively, fun book - I think Waters made some good films but his real gift is being him. He seems to have the best life, with a staff and apartments in Baltimore and New York and holidaying in Provincetown and lots of friends.

This is a series of essays. A biographical account of his career from Polyster up til the present day, how he does his one man show, a comic rant on sex acts, a brilliant chapter on Andy Warhol, a discussion with this imaginary child, a look at death, and various other matters. Consistently stimulating and always entertaining, a lot of fun.

Movie review - "Cecil B. Demented" (2000) **

 I film I wanted to like more than I did because it had such a fun central idea - Stephen Dorff as a demented film director leading a team of oddballs who kidnap a movie star (Melanie Griffith) to appear in their film.

Dorff is fine and believable as a loony leader of the cult, who include a lot of good actors like Maggie Gyllenhall, Alicia Witt and Michael Shannon. It was probably a fun movie to work on.

It feels like a movie that needed another few drafts of the script. Also it lacks a certain reality. Its soul is in the early 70s, when a lot more groups ran around doing kidnapping. Kidnapping doesn't feel like a late 90s thing. Neither does the whole band of outsiders or the fact they visit a drive in and a porno house.

Watching it, despite the strength of the cast, you just want Waters' old gang playing the parts - Divine, Mink Stole, Edie Massey and so on. They all felt genuinely weird. This feels like skilled actors playing weirdos which is a different thing. Alicia Witt is lovely but looks like, well, an actor playing a crazy rather than the real deal. (Dorff does have the right glint of madness.)

On a craft level, there's too many characters among the kidnappers and they all feel identical and Waters can't seem to dramatise his tale. For instance, it would seem natural to have a love triangle between Griffith, Dorff and Witt - it's all set up... but they don't go there. There's no conflict in the group, no twists and turns.

I'd love for this to be done as a musical with the story and character issues fixed because the central idea is to strong.

Movie review - "I am Divine" (2013) ***

 Affectionate look at the actor and pop star helped by some very good interviews - John Waters of course but also his mother (very touching about adoring and rejecting her son) and people like Mink Stole and various critics and drag queens. Divine had a great life - found fame, money, success. Not serious critical respect... I'm sure that would've come in time.

Movie review - "Mansfield 66/67" (2017) **

 Interesting documentary about Jayne Mansfield. The talking heads include John Waters (always fun), Mamie Van Doren, Mary Woronov, lots of PhD graduates, drag queens, Dolly Read from Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.

The cut aways to a stage musical doesn't quite work and there's a lot of emphasis on Mansfield's relationship with a Satanist. Wasn't that a small part of her life?

Good vision. Mansfield looked terrible towards the end.

It's fascinating how she's become this icon. She was only in two hit films. I guess she died interestingly.

Book review - "Hope for Film" by Ted Hope

 This book was always out at the LA library and I wondered why as it was a few years old until I realised that Hope was an exec at Amazon and presumably people wanted to suck up when they pitched projects to him.

This book goes up to just pre Amazon. Hope was at an odd stage of his career, having seen the indie film business be knocked out by the GFC and having a not-really-fun stint as head of the San Francisco Film Society.

The book is a combination of memoir, how-to, explaining financial models that aren't really there, and history.

There's terrific insights into the making of early films from Hal Hartley, Ang Lee, Ed Burns, Todd Solodonz. He worked with John Waters, Greg Molotta, Todd Field... lots of people. He doesn't hold back on criticism of people like Field and his one time girlfriend Tamara Jenkins and others.

I felt the book could have done with an edit to make it tighter but it was consistently interesting.

Book revew - "John Waters interviews" (2011)

John Waters is one of the liveliest directors as stars - one of the few you'd pay to see in concert (up there with Kevin Smith). He's informative, entertaining, funny, articulate, very bright on art. This is an entertaining collection of interviews which goes back before Pink Flamingos. It's remarkably consistent - he's had to answer the same questions a lot. It's a shame the book couldn't have cut out the opening intros by the magazine piece writers, these were a drag. There was fresh stuff here like him talking about Provincetown.

Book review - "Make Trouble" by John Waters

An address Waters gave to students at some graduating ceremony. It's a very short book - full of what seem to be slides. Funny, sharp, with a point - Waters gives great advice how to be an artist in the modern world, which is what he is of course.

Book review - "Role Models" by John Waters (2010)

A very funny top quality collection of essays from Waters that benefits from being personal. He writes with great insight and wit about such people as Johnny Mathis, Leslie Van Houton, Tennessee Williams (he likes the later plays more) and Patty McCormack but also more obscure types like the gay porn director who made movies out of having sex with straight Marines, a burlesque performer called Zorro. Usually funny, surprisingly insightful and moving.

Book review - "Crackpot: The Obssessions of John Waters" by John Waters

Bright collection of essays from one of the greatest director raconteurs (up there with Kevin Smith). It was originally published in 1986 but this edition updates it with some more recent articles, including the making of Hairpsray and several speeches from the Independent Film Awards which tend to over-rely on the one joke structure - Waters advising people in ways to be shocking ("have affairs", "when you accept an award say you deserve it"). This got repetitive and made me realise a lot of Waters' shtick is based on this. But when he writes from the heart - about Buddy Deaners, or teaching in prison, or his love for stuntmiesters like William Castle and actors like Pia Zadora, or review Hail Mary by Godard - he can't be beaten, and he's always funny.