Polyester (John Waters, 1981)

Judging by the way the harsh light of day cascaded off her legs as she sat on the pavement outside the entrance of the Crockfield Mall in suburban Baltimore, I'd say they were sheathed in a pair of tan pantyhose (legs in hose shimmer, legs not in hose... well, they... um... I think I'm going to be sick... ugh... let's try not dwell on hose-free gams, shall we?). Grabbing the foot that had just been stomped on by Dexter Fishpaw, a.k.a. The Baltimore Foot-Stomper, Shirley Evans (Susan Lowe), a.k.a. "The Mall Victim," cries out for help. But no assistance is forthcoming. Instead, she must sit there and watch as Dexter dances around her in a frenzied manner; his outward expression of arousal no doubt pressing tightly against the fly of his jeans as he danced... frenziedly. Later that week, Dexter is in the supermarket combing the aisles for a pair of feet worthy enough to stomp. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he spots a vision of foot-based loveliness in a tartan skirt and a snug-fitting burgundy sweater. Following the unnamed "Supermarket Victim" (Marina Melin) as she enters the aisle that contains products that boast water-soluble cleansing agents, Dexter can hardly contain his excitement, as her feet are simply sublime.

Overwhelmed by the erotic potency her feet are putting out there (the firmness of her black tights causes her feet to excrete a pungent odor that only he can smell), Dexter begins to fall over. Luckily for him, a shelf stacked with nothing but roll after roll of paper towels manages to break his fall.

Composing himself, Dexter approaches the supermarket victim and stomps of her left foot with all of his might. However, unlike the foot stomping that took place outside the mall entrance, two men come to the supermarket victim's aid almost immediately. Meaning, just as Dexter's outward expression of arousal was about to press tightly against the fly of his jeans, he's thrown into a giant stack of canned peas.

Oh, hello. This site hasn't, believe or not, turned into the place to satisfy all your Dexter Fishpaw fan fiction needs. It's still the place to read overlong essays about "cult movies." That being said, I felt compelled to start off my review of John Waters' Polyester with a piece that focuses primarily on the two instances in the film where Dexter Fishpaw is shown doing what he does best. And that is, stomping on women's feet.

The reason I felt compelled to do is easy, I admire the heck out of Dexter Fishpaw (Ken King), the combat boot-wearing, foot-obsessed rapscallion who also inhales solvents and does angel dust. Why? It's simple, really, he's passionate about something that doesn't exactly gel with mainstream society. Yet, at the same time, he doesn't seem to care what this so-called "mainstream society" might think about his varied interests.

Of course, a lot of you are probably wondering why I didn't start off my review with a tangent about Mink Stole in black stockings (attached to a black garter belt, no less). Well, I thought about doing that, but Dexter Fishpaw's plot line was impossible to ignore.

I know, the sight of Mink Stole, one of my favourite people in the known universe, prancing about in black stockings and cornrows(!) is impossible to ignore as well. But Dexter Fishpaw's plot line has so many ups and downs. And not only that, Dexter's foot stomping, if you think about it, actually prevents outside forces from destroying the Fishpaw way of life.

And what exactly does this way of life entail, you ask? Well, for one thing, it doesn't involve being humiliated by your porno theatre-owning husband on a daily basis. Poor Francine Fishpaw (Divine), all she wants to do live a normal, semi-productive life. Unfortunately for her, civil society has gone to shit.

The smut peddling antics of her husband, Elmer Fishpaw (David Samson) are bringing unwanted attention to her quiet cul-de-sac, her son Dexter is the Baltimore Foot-Stomper, her daughter, Lu-Lu Fishpaw (Mary Garlington), is a trampy Farrah Fawcett wannabe who's dating a scumbag named Bo-Bo Belsinger (Stiv Bators), and her mother is in cahoots with a shady Lothario named Todd Tomorrow (Tab Hunter). So, as you can see, Francine has no choice but to start drinking heavily.

To make matters worse, Lu-Lu is learning about her cervix at school and she's driving around Baltimore with Bo-Bo hitting non-wasp pedestrians with a broom. As terrible as the latter sounds, Bo-Bo meets his match when he stumbles upon Jean Hill while she's waiting for a bus. Remember when Jean Hill said in Desperate Living that she doesn't want no white man lookin' at her Tampax? Well, in this film, she doesn't want no white man hitting her in the ass with a broom, so she hijacks a bus, chases Bo-Bo down, bites one of his tires and beats the crap out of him.

At any rate, if that wasn't enough, Lu-Lu tells her mother that she's going to get a job as a go-go dancer at The Flaming Cave.

While having a lunch with her friend Cuddles (Edith Massey), a woman her mother describes as a "retarded scrubwoman," Francine gets a phone call from Susan Sullivan (Mink Stole), her husband's "secretary."

Sitting on Elmer's desk, Susan Sullivan hangs up the phone and begins to giggle while jiggling... or is she jiggling while giggling?!? Either way, Mink Stole is in black lingerie and I couldn't be more pleased by what is transpiring onscreen.

I don't know what it is about John Waters and heterosexuality, but like Mink Stole and David Lochary's relationship in Pink Flamingos (as Connie and Raymond Marble) and Mary Vivian Pearce and David Lochary's relationship in Female Trouble (as Donald and Donna Dasher), the pairing of Mink Stole and David Samson (as Susan Sullivan and Elmer Fishpaw) in Polyester depicts heterosexuality in a positive light.

Most movies look down on heterosexuality, but the films of John Waters seem to embrace it.

Suspecting that her husband is having an affair with his "secretary," Francine asks Cuddles to spy on them. However, before Cuddles can report back Francine, Lu-Lu tells her that she's two months pregnant. Which leads to this little nugget of scripted sunshine: "I'm getting an abortion and I can't wait." Just for the record, that particular passage is my second favourite line in the entire movie.

What's that? You wanna know what my favourite is. As luck would have it, it's coming right up.

Tracking Elmer and Susan down at a sleazy motel, Francine and Cuddles burst into their room to discover them sitting on the bed together. While that sounds innocuous, if you look closely, you'll notice that Elmer is drinking champagne out of one of Susan's red pumps. And you know what that means, right? Exactly, Mink Stole's nylon-ensnared feet are exposed for the world to see. And the world agrees, it's a beautiful thing.

Huh? Oh yeah, my favourite line. After the word divorce bandied about, Francine asks about Elmer's commitment to Dexter and Lu-Lu, Susan chimes in by saying: "Children would get in the way of our erotic lifestyle." I know, it's not quite up there with " I wouldn't suck your lousy dick if I was suffocating and there was oxygen in your balls! or "Tell your mother I hate her! Tell your mother I hate you!" as far as Mink-isms go, but I like the idea of people foregoing the drudgery of child rearing to live erotic lifestyles.

Putting aside the novelty that is "Odorama" (numbers appear on the screen periodically instructing you to sniff, using your Odorama card, a series of foul-smelling odors), Polyester was turning point for John Waters. The amateur, do-it-yourself aesthetic of his previous films has been replaced with helicopter shots, steadicam shots and professional stunts. The biggest change, however, comes in the form of Divine, who, for the first time in his career, is playing a part not associated with his Divine persona. At the time, this was seen as a bit of a gamble, but Divine, channeling his beloved Elizabeth Taylor, is pretty convincing as a stressed out housewife.

Mixing the crude humour and the social satire of his underground movies and combining it with classic Hollywood filmmaking techniques (think Douglas Sirk meets Russ Meyer), John Waters's Polyester is the best of both worlds. Competently made filth.

Excision (Richard Bates Jr., 2012)

When one of Gerald's friends in Welcome Home, Roxy Carmichael tells him that he thinks Winona Ryder's Dinky Bossetti is "ugly," I remember saying to myself: You have got to be fucking kidding? Sure, Dinky's hair is an unkempt disaster and her wardrobe looks like something a homeless Goth might wear, but she still looks like Winona Ryder (her skin is like porcelain). This lack of credibility when it came to taking the other character's perception of Dinky seriously didn't exactly ruin the movie for me, but it did irk me to a certain degree. Well, in a recent film called Excision, we're introduced to a character who comes pretty close to embodying the spirit of Dinky Bossetti, The Queen of Teen Angst. Except, instead of obsessing over a woman she thinks is her mother and taking care of  a menagerie of animals (each with a carpet sample to call their own), AnnaLynne McCord's Pauline dreams of performing surgery on her ill sister in her parent's garage, and, not to mention, looks at her bloody tampons with a wide-eyed, weigela-scented sense of wonder.

In the spirit of transparency, I should tell you that I watched Excision, written and directed by Richard Bates Jr., immediately after seeing Ryan Nicholson's Hanger. Why am I telling you this, you ask? It's simple, really. Both films feature characters who like to admire tampons that have been drenched in recently excreted menstrual blood. Talk about your weird coincidences.

Things get even weirder, coincidence-wise, when Excision throws an unorthodox abortion scene at us. If you remember correctly, Hanger boasts a gruesome coat-hanger abortion scene, too. While not as graphic as the scene in Hanger, the Excision abortion scene is nothing to poo-poo about. I think most of you will agree, putting an aborted foetus in a microwave oven (one that appears to have been specifically designed to dispose of unwanted foetal waste) after extracting it with your hand isn't something you see everyday, either.

However, that's where the similarities end. You see, whereas Hanger is a hate-filled, misogynistic slab of putrid bile masquerading as entertainment, Excision has a strong female lead and surreal flights of fancy that are visually interesting.

Oooh, I just remembered, the real reason I brought up Welcome Home, Roxy Carmichael. It's true, I already made my point regarding the two films, but I sort of got taken off track by the whole tampon/abortion thing. Anyway, I felt Excision got the look of the teenage outsider right.

Now, I've since discovered that AnnaLynne McCord has been on a lot television shows. But since I've never seen any of them, I approached AnnaLynne McCord as just another actress. Meaning, I didn't spend the bulk of the film thinking: Wow, the chick from 90210 is doing some freaky ass shit in this movie.

You could view this as just another example of an attractive actress "going ugly" for critical accolades. And, after looking at some of the pictures of AnnaLynne McCord outside the Excision universe, I can see how some might take that particular view. But I don't think that's what's going on here, as AnnaLynne McCord seems fully-committed to the role of Pauline, a troubled teen who has a, let's just say, rich and colourful imagination.

The film opens inside the realm of this rich and colourful imagination. In there we see two versions of Pauline facing each other. One is twitching like a Clicker (the nickname given to humans in the third stage of the Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis infection - I despise Clickers, by the way) from The Last of Us, while the other is sitting still. Suddenly, the twitchy Pauline starts bleeding profusely from her nose and mouth. When the twitchy Pauline spits blood all over the still Pauline, the real Pauline wakes up.

Whew, for a minute I thought the entire film was going to take place inside this antiseptic nightmarescape. Don't get me wrong, I could have handled it. But, nevertheless, I appreciated the fact that Richard Bates Jr. didn't go overboard when doling out the weirdness.

Besides, there's plenty of weirdness to go around in the real world. I mean, John Waters plays a reverend, Malcolm McDowell plays a math teacher, Ray Wise plays a high school principal, Matthew Gray Gubler plays a sex ed. teacher and best of all, Traci Lords plays Pauline's mother.

After watching Pauline's family, which also includes Bob (Roger Bart), her henpecked father, and Grace (Ariel Winter), her little sister (who has cystic fibrosis), sitting together at the breakfast table for just a few seconds, it's obvious that they're a tad on the dysfunctional side.

Asking her sex ed. teacher if you can contract an STD by having sex with a dead body establishes right away that Pauline ain't hooked up right. I know, the twitchy, blood spewing dream sequence already did a pretty good job of establishing that. But, to be fair, everyone dreams about spastic doppelgängers who vomit blood; it's one of the great things about being human.

While each dream sequence is different, they all pretty much stick with the same theme. And that is: Blood, bandages, bodies and sex. Oh, and did I mention blood?

Approaching Adam (Jeremy Sumpter), who is sitting on the bleachers at school with his friends, Pauline tells the startled teen that she wants to lose her virginity with him. Now, most teenage boys wouldn't hesitate for a second to accept an offer like that. But then again, Pauline isn't your average teenage girl -- At one point she tells her sister, "When I lose my virginity, I want to be on my period." Yum.

In an obvious shout-out to Heathers, we see Pauline and Grace playing crochet on their front lawn. Later that night, guess who calls Pauline? That's right, Adam. It would seem that he's willing to look past her greasy hair, bad posture, acne and unruly eyebrows in order to attain some guilt-free teenage poontang. It's too bad it's soaking in menstrual blood. Don't believe me, take a look in the mirror, the bloodstained fruits of your cunnilingual labour are all over your face.

In an upcoming scene, Pauline will compare Adam's pussy eating technique to a dog drinking water (which, apparently, isn't a good thing - I love the thought of a guy lapping up my labia like a thirsty dog). She also describes Adam's girlfriend's vagina as a "diseased axe wound." Hee. Oh, and when Adam's girlfriend (who, by the way, doesn't know how to spell "cunt") tries to give Pauline a piece of advice, she says, "Make it quick, I gotta go take a shit." Classy.

Even though I didn't approve with a lot of what Pauline gets up to in this film, I couldn't help but sympathize with her outlandish predicament. And that's thanks in part to the amazing performance given by AnnaLynne McCord. The exact same thing can be said for Traci Lords, who kills it as Pauline's overbearing mother. If you're going to see one movie about a surgery-obsessed teen with  fallen arches, make it Excision. It's well-made, darkly funny and is sprinkled with fine performances. Oh, and did I mention blood?

Pink Flamingos (John Waters, 1972)

You probably wouldn't come to this conclusion by looking at it from a pedestrian point-of-view. However, if you were to say switch to a more cockeyed point-of-view, you would definitely agree with me when I say that John Waters' infamous Pink Flamingos is one of the sexiest movies of all-time. I know, how can a movie that features shit-eating, a chicken coop foursome, shrimping, singing assholes, blue-haired degenerates with pepperoni tied to their dicks and obese retarded women in playpens be considered one of the sexiest... Whoa! Would you listen to me, I'm starting to sound like a real square. Which is odd, because I'm the least square person I know. Sure, I don't drink, I don't do drugs, and I've never been to Flin Flon, but trust me, the thoughts rattling around in my head on a semi-regular basis are beyond debased. What I think I meant to say was: How can a movie that features shit-eating, a chicken coop foursome, shrimping, singing assholes, blue-haired degenerates with pepperoni tied to their dicks and obese retarded women in playpens not be considered one of the sexiest movie of all-time?

Oh, and when I say, "singing assholes," I'm not referring to, oh, let's say, the guy from Nickleback (I don't feel like looking up his name, but you know who I'm talking about - his first name is either Chad or Brad), I'm talking about an anus that sings... well, to be technical, it lip-synchs. Either way, Pink Flamingos is a non-stop cavalcade of crotch-based wetness from start to finish.

Think I'm joking? How else would you describe a movie that boasts Mink Stole in jet black pantyhose, Mary Vivian Pearce in jet black pantyhose and Cookie Mueller in, you guessed it, jet black pantyhose? What's that? I didn't hear you. Speak up. That's right, it's a non-stop cavalcade of crotch-based wetness from start to finish, and don't you forget it.

Since my raison d'être involves filling in holes that are gaping in nature, it only makes sense that I review Pink Flamingos. What I mean is, it's been bothering me for quite some time that there isn't a Pink Flamingos review on this site. It's not that I love the film (it's no Female Trouble... and it's no Desperate Living either), it's that the film features Mink Stole at her most churlishly gorgeous.

Yes, I realize Mink Stole is gorgeously churlish in everything she appears in. But in Pink Flamingos, she seems to be firing on all cylinders. It could be the bright red hair, it could be sparkly cat eye glasses, but there's something extra churlish, extra gorgeous about her as Connie Marble, The Filthiest Woman Alive.

Huh? You say, Divine, a.k.a. Babs Johnson (Divine) is the real "Filthiest Person Alive," and that Connie Marble and her wonderfully perverted husband, Raymond (David Lochary), are merely jealous posers who wouldn't know true filthiness if it bit them on their scab-laden taints.

If that's the case, I'm going to have to disagree with you. I mean, does Divine keep kidnapped hippie chicks locked in her cellar? Does she even have a cellar? Does Divine force their cross-dressing chauffeur to impregnate the cellar-dwelling hippie chicks and then sell the babies to lesbian couples? I didn't think so.

Actually, the more I think about it, the less filthy it sounds. Don't get me wrong, kidnapping and raping women (even if there are hippies) is not morally correct. But providing lesbian couples with low-cost babies is awesome.

Filthy or not, I'm still trying to figure out how Connie Marble, thrift store goddess of the wasteland, managed to be bested by such trailer trash.

On the surface, Divine/Babs Johnson, her trusted traveling companion, Cotton (Mary Vivian Pearce), her delinquent son, Crackers (Danny Mills), and her mentally-ill mother, Miss Edie (Edith Massey), looked like they would be no match for the filthiness Connie and Raymond Marble were putting out there. But it just goes to show that you should maybe think twice before mailing someone a bowel movement, as what they send back could be even worse.

As Crackers says, "No one sends you a turd and expects to live!"

While Miss Edie is waiting in her playpen for her beloved Eggman (Paul Swift) to deliver the eggs she craves, Connie is interviewing Sandy Sandstone (Nancy Crystal) for a job she has no intention of giving her. I know, what's the point of interviewing someone for a job if you have no intention of hiring them? Well, that's just the way Connie operates.

When Miss Sandstone realizes she isn't getting the job, she starts whining incessantly. This, as you might expect, does not sit well with Connie, who lashes out at Miss Sandstone with a series of cruel one-liners. My favourite, of course, being: "I guess there's just two kinds of people, Miss Sandstone: My kind of people, and assholes. It's rather obvious which category you fit into. Have a nice day."

Meanwhile, back at Babs' trailer (located in a wooded area on the outskirts of Phoenix, Maryland), Babs and Crackers are getting ready to go into town; the latter to pick up his date and the former is going to run some errands. And by "errands," I mean, shove a steak between her legs, take a piss in front of large house and strut down the street to Little Richard's "The Girl Can't Help It."

After successfully placing "Little Noodles" with a lesbian couple named Annette and Merle, Connie... Wait, I think I should mention that "Little Noodles" is the name of the baby one of the women locked in "The Pit" gave birth to. Like I said earlier, the Marbles run a baby ring out of their suburban home. They also own a couple of pornography shops and sell heroin to school children.

Anyway, after the baby is handed over to the dykes (don't worry about the baby's mother, she died during child birth), Connie starts to stress over the whereabouts of Raymond.

He's out doing what most people were doing back in the early 1970s, flashing his pepperoni-enhanced junk at leggy teenage girls in the park.

It turns out that Crackers' date is a spy working for the Marbles. Hired to get dirt on Divine, Cookie (Cookie Mueller) goes that extra mile to extract the information the Marbles will desperately need if they expect to claim the title of "The Filthiest People Alive." And if that means participating in a chicken coop foursome with Crackers and two live chickens while Cotton watches, than so be it.

Since "The Pit" must contain at least two women at all times, Connie and Raymond pluck a hitchhiker named Linda (Linda Olgeirson) off the street and dump her in "The Pit" with the alluringly foul-mouthed and very pregnant Suzie (Susan Walsh). When Suzie realizes Channing plans on inseminating Linda using a cum-filled syringe, she vomits. The cool thing about the vomit scene is it occurs just as Channing is about to ejaculate seminal fluid into his hand. Jizz and puke, together at last.

While jizz and puke are great and all, nothing comes close to topping the sight of Connie and Raymond sucking on one another's toes. Taking a break to bask in the information Cookie obtained for them, Connie (who is wearing nothing but a white pair of men's underpants) and Raymond (who is wearing nothing but ladies drawers) continue to suck each other's toes. But as they're doing so, they proclaim their love for one another using exaggerated language.

"Oh, I am yours, Connie, eternally united to you through an invisible cord of finely woven filth that even God himself could never, ever break." - Raymond Marble

I think most people will agree that the relationship that Connie and Raymond Marble have with one another is truly an inspiration to us all. I mean, their love is so fucking powerful. It's too bad their obsession with becoming "The Filthiest People Alive" clouded their ability to think straight.

Call me someone who isn't hooked up right, but the only parts of Pink Flamingos that grossed me out were the scenes that featured Edith Massey eating eggs. Seriously, someone get this woman a bib. 

As for the other so-called gross scenes. I, say, what gross scenes? There's nothing gross about the sight of Mink Stole, Mary Vivian Pearce and Cookie Mueller lounging in jet black pantyhose. And the part where Raymond comes pepperoni-enhanced-cock-to-floppy-girly-cock with a leggy transgender woman (Elizabeth Coffey) in the park, well, that scene was simply delightful.

Maybe I've become jaded over the years, but I've come to view Pink Flamingos more as an erotic comedy than anything else. Sure, the uninitiated will still find material in it to be shocked by. But deep down, the film is an eerily accurate reflection of the times, the early 1970s. And it contains what I consider to be Mink Stole's best role to date. It should go without saying, but I love her more than my own shit.