Last night I decided to finally see this film. It came with a Deal from the local pizza place. Since it was the only film available, I was really short on options.
There are a few things you should prepare yourself for before seeing this film.
First of all it would be a really good idea to have your preferred (or potential) therapist on speed-dial. You’ll need his $400-an-hour mumbling to calm you down once you’ve moved your head close enough to the screen to notice that Tracy’s mother is 1) not an actual female and 2) John Travolta.
This mere observation alone can potentially leave you emotionally scarred for life. Particularly when s/he starts to dance around Christopher Walken, in “Fred Astair”-style of course, singing about their mutual love for each other. If you aren’t feeling a bit queezy by now, wait until you see his/her dress.
However, provided you’re able to keep the delusion of the man being a woman and able to give birth, it’s quite entertaining. If you totally disregard the voice breaking every time he breaks out in songs of course.
Amazingly enough he does manage to make his movements feminine and not very manlike. Despite the Moby Dick-armour he’s wearing to pretend we’re looking at a “Big Mama”.
I remember watching “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert” starring Hugo Weaving and Guy Pierce as drag queens travelling to central Australia. Wicked amusing film, I recommend it.
The part I did notice the most is that even though they were men who wanted to be like women running around in stilettos and thongs (Scarred for life, Thank you), there was always something posed and fake when attempting to be “woman like”.
A woman walks in a certain way. Without effort or strain. She makes no effort trying to be feminine, she just naturally is.
And in Hairspray, John Travolta sure could have fooled me had Marius not mentioned it was him.
In my defence, our television is rather small, has low resolution, I wasn’t wearing my contact lenses and was sitting rather far away from it. For all I knew, that was a really fat lady with a butch voice.
Putting aside John Travolta in a red sequin dress shaking his ass provokingly on live television. the film offers a variety of further emotional damage.
Catchy tunes, morale subtext and fast moves to prove that even though you’re fat or black, Television isn’t that hard to get on.
I absolutely HATED this movie. It could’ve had hot guys in suits banging chicks with big boobs in the background, and I probably still would’ve hated it. The original was superior in every way, and they should’ve never attempted this shitfest.
*stomps away*
You should check out the original John Waters non-musical version from 1988. Although, Tracy’s mother is always portrayed by a man. In the original Edna was played by Divine, a famous actor/drag queen who has since passed away. In the version of the musical that’s on Broadway Edna is also played by a man.
Being a native Baltimorean, the main reason I didn’t like this film too much was because they didn’t SHOOT it in Baltimore, instead they shot it in Toronto. The idea is that all John Waters films take place in Baltimore AND are shot there. So the street scenes were kind of faked up and super obvious to me because while I enjoy visiting Toronto, the buildings/city planning/history is WAY different.
Songs were catchy though…. I can’t help but like “Good Morning Baltimore”.
Musicals put me to sleep so I don’t watch them. That movie was popular among the women because of Zac Efron from High School Musical. I heard the original was better so if I ever want to watch it, I’ll probably watch the old version.
Haha, I’m considering going to see it xD
It sounds quite amusing!