Pink Flamingos (1972)

Celebrating 50 Years of 'Joyous Obscenity'

Yes it's 50 years since John Waters' first colour feature film premiered in the director's hometown of Baltimore, Maryland and, while it took some time to gain its following on the midnight movie circuit courtesy of New Line Cinema, the world has never been quite the same since. To celebrate, Criterion are bringing out an anniversary Blu-ray (the film itself has been on the Criterion label since the US laserdisc release of 1997) that has, some might say miraculously considering some of the material in here, been passed uncut with a BBFC 18 certificate.

  Most people reading this review will have likely already seen it but if you haven't, be aware that, much like Sam Raimi's original EVIL DEAD, the intention of Waters to create an act of 'comedy terrorism' combined with the inexperience of all concerned, resulted in a film that's much more disturbing than was perhaps the intention.

Divine (Divine) is hiding out in a trailer in the middle of nowhere (actually a freezing Baltimore forest) with her bizarre 'family': Crackers (Danny Mills), Cotton (Mary Vivian Pearce) and Edie (Edith Massey) who is obsessed with eggs and spends most of her time confined to a playpen. Meanwhile newspaper headlines trumpet Divine as the 'Filthiest Person Alive'.

Extremely unhappy about this pronouncement are Connie and Raymond Marble (Mink Stole and David Lochary) who run a business abducting women, keeping them in a pit, artificially inseminating them by the most grungy and obscene method possible, and then selling the babies to lesbian couples. They feel they deserve the 'Filthiest' title and plan to put an end to Divine's reign. But Divine hasn't earned that title for nothing.

'We were the hate generation' says Waters in the second of two commentary tracks on Criterion's disc and perhaps that's why, amateurish as it is, PINK FLAMINGOS still works, if you can stomach it. Despite its intention to be a comedy it's difficult to ignore all the screaming and ranting, all the obscene behaviour, and all that taboo-breaking as a symptom of a very disaffected society indeed. Perhaps that's why it still feels relevant now.

Criterion's disc features a new 30 minute conversation between Waters and film director Jim Jarmusch, as well as a new 22 minute featurette of Waters visiting the movie's locations. Archival material includes the two Waters commentaries (from 1997 and 2001), '25th Anniversary Footage' which is 13 minutes of deleted scenes with a Waters linking commentary from 1997, as well as 25 minutes of outtake footage. Finally, there's DIVINE TRASH, Steve Yeager's 1998 feature length documentary about the film that features interviews and archive footage of many of the cast and crew. The package also comes with a booklet (not supplied for review) that includes an essay by Howard Hampton and an excerpt from Cookie Mueller's book Walking Through Clear Water in a Pool Painted Black.

John Waters' PINK FLAMINGOS is out from Criterion on 

Blu-ray in its 50th Anniversary Edition on Monday 25th July 2022