Okay, I swear to you this is my last post on A Dirty Shame. It’s just that today is the day that the film is being unleashed on the world and I wanted to take a few moments and reflect on the consequential ramifications. I promise to try my best to NOT allow this to become a weblog film criticism. I generally hate it when weblog writers try to be film critics. I have about half a dozen film critics whom I trust, and I assure you none to them are bloggers.

With that said, I did see the film on Monday. Was the direction sloppy? Of course it was, it’s a John Waters film. The writing in a Waters film is always inconsistent and will typically drag from the halfway point to the final orgy of absurdity which signals the finis off the film. In that regard, this film didn’t disappoint my expectations. But that's not how to measure the success or failure of one of his movies. The genius is the filth.

As everyone here knows, I’m a huge fan of filth. If genius is to be measured in filth, this movie was fucking brilliant. The film successfully shocked me. Every time that I thought Waters had reached the very limits of the human imagination in regard to filth, he would punch through another wall and show me that I have no imagination whatsoever, and he did it over and over and over again. It was so filthy, so absurd, so disgusting and yet so childlike in it’s innocence that I couldn’t help but shed a tear in the name of civic pride. If Waters had been sitting next to me I would have hugged him, said thank you, and then I would have blubbered like a woman.

In much the same way that everyone in the world is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day, when a John Waters movie is unleashed EVERYONE who buys a ticket is a Baltimorean (with the exception of Cecil B. Demented. That movie just plain sucked). Let there be no mistake, John Waters is our cultural ambassador to the world. Fuck Edgar Allen Poe. After watching A Dirty Shame, I wanted to petition the National Football League to rename our team the Pink Flamingos, change the uniforms from faggy purple to faggy pink, and replace the cheerleaders with hideously ugly transvestites, who during half-time, would run up and down the sideline exposing themselves to the stadium. How is it that I know that nobody is going to agree with me on that one?

Last night I ran into an old friend Sarah, who unlike me is a lifetime Baltimorean. I’m just a transplanted DC phony (if for nothing else, go see the movie to see the representation of the transplanted DC phonies. They have formstone installed on their hamilton home to give it a more “authentic” Baltimore feel. Ha! You know, it could be argued that this entire site is not all together unlike their home. But more on my DC phoniness next week). She is in her first year of a graduate program, and prior to seeing the movie, had recommended to the other first year graduate students that they see the film to gain a stronger understanding of the city. She has since seen the movie, had herself been shocked, and was worried that she had made a mistake recommending the movie. I told her that was nonsense. It’s best that they learn now. Hells Angels who attended the premiere, were interviewed upon leaving the theater. Their reaction? They were shocked. How awesome is that? You may disagree with me, but this is exactly the kind of attention for Baltimore that I like to see.

Granted, this is of course from the perspective of a transplant DC phony Baltimorean. Eventually, practically everyone in this city will eventually see the film as a matter of civic duty. When I was in the theater for a matinee, the theater was half-full with students, middle-aged work shirkers, eighty-year old retirees, members of the various clergies and everyone was laughing thier gonads off. I too have mocked O’Malley’s silly moniker for the city, but after watching Tracy Ullman waddling around a retirement home with a water bottle sticking out from between her legs, sitting in a theater whole heartedly enjoying myself with what I knew was a genuine cross section of the city, how could anyone ever question whether or not this is in fact, The Greatest City in America?

p.s.

I just read Michael O’Sullivan’s review of the film for the Washington Post. It was a positive review, but I bet you can all guess what detail about the film was left out but mentioned in every other review of the film. Ha!