Desperate Living

Rating:
Summary: I Dare You Not to Laugh!
Review: This is John Waters at his most sick, depraved and politically incorrect. It is also side-splittingly horrifying and hilarious. His stable of psycho stars, especially Mink Stole and Liz Renay, are impossible not to watch with dropped jaws of stunned amazement. DESPERATE LIVING is a fractured fairy tale that fans of the Waters genre will enjoy again and again.

The commentary track with Waters and Renay is also fun and funny. They are two folks with a refreshing candor and obvious zest for living that should inspire us all!

Rating:
Summary: Desperately debauched & deliciously depraved.
Review: With DESPERATE LIVING, the demented genius John Waters has come up with a movie almost on a par with his most notorious bad taste classic PINK FLAMINGOS. DESPERATE LIVING is best described as a warped contempory fairy tale with lashings of ketcupy gore (a homage to Herschell Gordon Lewis perhaps?).
Written and Directed by Waters, this stars Mink Stole as Peggy Gravel, a mentally unbalanced suburban housewife drivine to the brink of madness by her amorous children, cruel husband & their alcoholic maid Grizelda Brown (Jean Hill).
However after the chunkily built Grizelda murders Mr. Gravel by sitting on him & squashing him to death; she & Peggy go on the lam, crossing paths with a wacko cop who has a fetish for women's lingerie. He is also a chivalrous romantic who has a strange request to make of Peggy: "I'd like to stick my whole head in your mouth & let you suck out my eyeballs". Now there's a pick-up line that's guaranteed to work every time!
After escaping being assaulted by this crazed copper; Peggy & Grizelda wind up seeking refuge in a low rent village/slum called Mortville where they shack up with lesbian wrestler Mole (Susan Lowe) & her vulgar, trashy lover Muffy (Liz Renay); a disturbed individual whose leisure pursuits include driving a meat fork through her hand for fun. But alas their solitude proves to be short-lived, as the corrupt ruler of Mortville, Queen Carlotta (Edith Massey) has sent her guards out to arrest & execute all homosexuals; but they mistakenly arrest Peggy & Grizelda. Soon the repressed townspeople band together to stage a violent revolt against their revolting dictator & her submissive slave-servants.
As with all Waters early films, you will either find this to be absoutely hilarious or downright depraved. I am of the former mindset. Fans of the director will be delighted with this. No spoilers but the special highlight for me was Mole's botched sex-change operation- utterly repulsive, sick & hilarious. You have to see it to believe it. Highly recommended, but be forewarned: Edith gets her kit off. Aiieee!