Avoid Pink Flamingos

Posted under Thoughts

Pflamingos_2
During my early “art film” phase during college, I had an opportunity to see the movie Pink Flamingos by Roger Waters. The other day, I was looking through the upcoming films on Encore cable, and noticed Pink Flamingos was being shown. You may have heard how great this film is, how “brilliant” it is. Well, all I can say is I recommend stay away. You may have been charmed by John Water’s Hairspray. You may have laughed yourself silly at Pecker and Serial Mom. Pink Flamingos is neither charming or funny. It is disgusting - many consider it the most disgusting film ever made. I have to actually wonder about the people who aren’t sickened by some of the sights in this movie.

Some oddball things I remember about this film that probably led to the wrong people seeing it is for the longest time, it never carried an MPAA rating. I may be remembering it wrong, but I could have sworn I saw a VHS box years ago displaying Pink Flamingos with a G rating. According to John Water’s book Shock Value, it was even shown in churches at first since no legitimate movie theater would touch it. Why the churches allowed it to be shown isn’t known. The current rating is: MPAA: Rated NC-17 for a wide range of perversions in explicit detail. You have been warned!

Like all of John Water’s early films, by the time it ended, I felt sick to my stomach and wondering why I had wasted 1.5 to 2 hours of my life with such idiocy.

Have you seen this film? If so, am I wrong?