The Diane Linkletter Story

This little gem has been almost impossible to find. It's one of John Waters early short films. It was minimally released with Mondo Trasho when first produced, but not included when Mondo Trasho achieved an actual video release, which was John Waters first full length feature film. Thanks to YouTube, we can now finally get to enjoy it. How it got out is anyone's guess. I always assumed that like all his early short films, you had to be able to snatch it directly from John Waters attic to be able to view it. I haven't seen any other of his shorts on YouTube, but keep a look out, you never know what will surface. Some others to look for are "Eat Your Makeup", "Hag in a black Leather Jacket", and "Roman Candles". The Diane Linkletter Story is only about 10 minutes long, therefore it is presented to you in its entirety on the YouTube video below this post. It was actually only made to test a new camera with sound. It's simplicity is apparent of being a test take, it has a truly creepy ring to it. It was filmed the day after Diane Linkletter (Art Linkletters daughter) committed suicide by jumping out of a window while on the mother of all acid trips. Divine plays Diane Linkletter (naturally) with David Lochary as Art Linkletter and Mary Vivian Pearce as his wife. The parents bicker for about six minutes, Diane comes home high as a kite, she runs to her room crying out for her boyfriend Jim then takes a flying leap out the window, the end. After his daughters suicide, Art Linkletter released an album addressed to his daughter called "We Love You, Call Collect" which is played during Waters' film (creepy). Enjoy!

Trouble in Mind

I never in a million years could possibly conceive the idea that there would ever be a movie out there with Divine in it that I didn't love. I found one... I'm very sad about this so bear with. The truth is, I'm not totally sure what this film was about. I watched all 120 minutes of it desperately trying to tolerate an endless parade of stupid characters doing stupid things while waiting patiently for Divine's grand entrance. This is labeled a "crime drama" (with Divine?!) and is pretty hard to find now, I stumbled across it merely by chance. Imagine my excitement! Behold my disappointment!! Anyway, it's a crime drama (still don't know what exactly what the crime was) starring Lori Singer who stumbles around aimlessly, doing her best "Daryl Hannah in Splash" impersonation. The only difference is that she carries a baby around with her everywhere. She has a weird boyfriend that slowly gets weirder as the movie goes on. First he starts wearing a new stiffly sprayed pompadour hairdo. Then the hairdo has color streaks. By the end of the film he has pieced ears and full makeup (so 80's). Throw in Kris Kristofferson and Keith Carradine as some sort of law enforcing agents and there you have it. Divine's screen time was minimal at best. He plays some kind of eccentric gay mobfather. Snow white hair, a huge diamond earring and a solid black suit. He was obviously placed in the film because he was Divine. This was after Polyester but before Hairspray when Divine was finally starting to become a well known entertainer. His cameo is brief and in the end, he gets shot in the head. I can't really say that this is probably a movie Divine would have eventually hated as would be expected (well, it sucked), but I can say that it was nice to see Divine finally shown some true respect as an actor and placed in a big budget film as a cameo. Had he not died shortly after Hairspray, he would have seen a tremendous increase in his stardom because Hairspray was a huge hit. Oh well, those are the breaks. Even though this movie was terrible, I still savored every single second that Divine left on film.

Polyester

John Waters sixth full length film. By the time Polyester came out, John Waters was doing considerably less drugs and his movies began to move in a more mainstream direction. Waters managed to sign Tab Hunter to the cast and Debbie Harry (Blondie) to do the soundtrack. This movie is much tamer than his earlier films but still retains that wonderful unique sense of humour that Johns movies have always had, and was the perfect prelude to Hairspray (his first truly mainstream success). Divine plays Francine Fishpaw, a hopelessly humdrum housewife with a husband that owns a XXX theater and prefers the company of the dog over his wife. A daughter named Lulu that is the epitome of "bad girl". A son named Dexter that is heavily abusing drugs and roams around Baltimore stomping on peoples feet for the fun of it. Her husband runs off with his secretary which causes Francine to become an serious alcoholic. But better times are on the way when Francine meets Todd Tomorrow (Tab Hunter). Todd is flashy and rich and sweeps Francine off her feet. In addition, Lulu has had a miscarriage and becomes a good girl obsessed with macrame'. Dexter is arrested for being the "Baltimore Foot Stomper" and is released on an insanity defense. Everything looks rosy until it all comes crashing down when we learn that Todd and Francine's mother are planning to frame Francine, admit her to a mental institution, sell her kids into sex slavery, and run off with the money from selling her house. Edith massey makes a great comeback as Francine's best (and only) friend Cuddles. Mink Stole is another one of John Waters "originals" that makes a reappearance. Most of his early actors had died off due to AIDS and drug overdoses by the time Waters made this movie. Mary Vivian Pearce and Cookie Mueller also make small guest appearances. A fun gimmick that went along with this movie is that it was filmed in "odorama". When the movie was released, a card with twelve scratch and sniff numbers on it was given to the audience members. When you saw the number flashed in the lower corner of the screen, you scratched and sniffed the corresponding number on your card to experience the same smells that would be experienced by the characters. Unfortunately, the smells are terrible... gasoline, a fart, stinky sneakers, pizza, etc. Tying this into the theme of the movie wasn't hard due to the fact that Francine was obsessed with air fresheners and apparently has the nose of a bloodhound. Not nearly as shocking as his earlier films, yet still packed with all the hilarity that emanates from the genius that is John Waters.

Multiple Maniacs

This is John Waters second full-length feature. Much more of a story than Mondo Trasho. Multiple Maniacs deals with Lady Divine who runs Lady Divine's Cavalcade of Perversion. A freak show where one can enjoy puke-eaters, queers kissing on the lips and a heroin addict going through withdrawal. Before the show is over, the people who run the cavalcade trap the customers in a net and rob them blind. All in a days work for the always glamorous Lady Divine. Soon she gets bored running with the show and wants to just kill people for the hell of it. She finds out that her boyfriend Mr David is cheating with a Jean Harlow lookalike. She sets out to kill him and gets raped, has a religious vision, and gets fucked in a church by a lesbian with her rosary beads along the way. Mr David and Jean Harlow have now decided to kill Lady Divine so that they can be together. Jean Harlow accidentally kills Divines daughter Cookie and botches the whole thing. Eventually everyone dies except Divine who has now been reduced to sheer insanity. Just when things things can't look any rosier, a giant lobster comes out of nowhere and rapes Divine. This is definately the last straw for Lady Divine and she takes to the streets like Godzilla in drag, destroying everything she sees. She's eventually hunted down by the military and shot down "in a very Godzilla like way". A somewhat shocking laugh riot.

Mondo Trasho

This was John Waters first full length feature film. Before this he had made some short films that cult fiends are dying to be released. But alas, this is this is the earliest John Waters film out there, I had a heck of a time finding it. There's no actual dialogue, only sound clips from records from John Waters personal collection. This one's often been referred to "the gutter film", mostly because it actually was filmed in the gutters and alleyways of downtown Baltimore. Like I said, there's no real dialogue but as best I can surmise, the story goes something like this: A blonde bombshell (Divine of course) accidentally runs over a woman that has spent most of her day getting her toes sucked on by a strange man in a park. Divine stuffs the girl in her trunk and carts it around town, running into the Virgin Mary in a laundromat to a naked dancing mental patient as well as other religious visions. Divines downfall culminates in a strange ending of Divine dying in a pig pen. This is the only John Waters movie that I have a hard time sitting all the way through. The sound clips used, are used over and over and over. The story, which is actually pretty thin, is stretched out for an hour and a half. Even John Waters himself has said that it should have been a half hour short film much like his early stuff, rather than a full length fim. But Hey, it was a start. Only for true John Waters fans like me.

Female Trouble

Follow Dawn Davenport as she goes from pick-pocketing high school dropout to mutant fashion model. It starts at The Lipstick Beauty Salon owned by Donald and Donna Dasher. Two extreme stereotypes of the snobby super wealthy. You even have to audition to get your hair done at their prestigious salon. Only women of a mega trashy flavor is good enough for their salon. All others are referred to Mr.Ray's Wig World. Dawn gets married to a louse and has the brattiest daughter ever conceived. But when the Dasher's ask Dawn to be a part of their beauty experiment, Dawn becomes intrigued. You see, they believe that crime is beauty. The worse the crime, the more raveshing one becomes. A model, but mostly a glamourous guinea pig. Who else to fill this need, but the notorious beauty Divine, making a splash in her fourth full-length feature film. And by far considered to be one of his absolute best. Written specifically as a vehicle for Divine, it follows her from youth to the electric chair with tons of hilarity in between.

Pink Flamingos

From John Waters, the king of trash, comes Pink Flamingos. The story of the notorious Divine, the filthiest person alive and proud of it. Because of her criminal lifestyle, Divine has been forced to go underground and adapt the alias of Babs Johnson. Connie and Raymond Marble are "two jealous perverts" who loathe Divine and are bent on destroying her reputation and stealing her title as the filthiest people alive. The Marbles run an illegal baby ring where female hitchhikers are thrown in a dungeon, impregnated and the babies sold to lesbian couples. They also fuel money to a gang of heroin pushers in the local elementary school. All this combined cannot top the notorious beauty Divine, who along with her travelling companion Miss Cotton, her mentally ill mother Miss Edie and her delinquent son Crackers overthrow the Marbles and reclaim their position as the filthiest people in the world. Stay tuned when the movie comes to a close because Divine has a little something extra to show us. For not only is she the filtiest person alive, she is also the filthiest actress alive. She proves this by gagging on some freshly squeezed dog doo. An ending that could make anyone gag. It's great!