Pink Flamingos (1972)

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... the business is just a little more than a tad bit unconventional. They kidnap innocent young women, their butler impregnates these women, the women are then kept in captivity until they have the child, and the child is then sold to lesbian couples. Our entrepreneurs are not heartless however. Some of the profit from the sale goes to heroin addicts and various pornography shops. Think of it as charity! Anyway, this brings us to the basic plot that surrounds the film. The filthiest couple claims that they together are the filthiest people alive and will stop at nothing to claim this title from Divine. The battle has begun!

I could go on and on about the films filthiness, but there is a lot more to Water's film than just almost every single disgusting act or wretchedness that you can think of. The actors in the film suggest that they were suddenly costumed from a thrift store, not given any character direction or coaching in the least, and left, by our director, to lollygag throughout their entire roles with the littlest attention given to any production value. Does the production value bring the film down to shit-list status? Absolutely not, and although the film does take some time to get used to, soon you will be laughing in hysterics at the cast, the films concept, and the way every single ethical moral in film-making, as of 1972, because of John Waters, has just innocently fluttered out a wide open window.


Pink Flamingos is basically the senior school play that I always wanted to be a part of, but nobody could direct without consequently being thrown in slammer. Still, it's not so hard to imagine a film, which derives purely on filth, becoming such a huge cult classic either. Maybe it's the fowl use of nudity or just the overall perversion of the film that sends it over the edge, but if you're anything like me and a rather large handful of midnight film goers, it's an edge you'll probably want to cross again and again.


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