My Hero: John Waters

John Waters is a film maker, actor, stand up comic, author and much more. He's been on my mind lately. I've been thinking about a film he made where there was a freak show with performers such as the bicycle seat sniffer and the puke eater. When I was in High School I had bootleg copies of most of his films. I became after reading about his films in the Video Guide, a huge paperback book I used to call The Bible. The worst movies in the Video Guide were rated as turkeys and it was these films that interested me the most. I read that Pink Flamingos was about a fat drag queen who ate dog poop and knew I must find and watch this movie!

Pink Flamingos was a record breaking film of it's time. I believe it grossed 100 times it's budget in just it's theatrical run. It played midnight shows for many years. I read that when a theater stopped showing Pink Flamingos at midnight a riot broke out with biker gangs yelling "We want to see the fat fag eat dog shit!!". It's a very funny as are all of Mr. Waters films and books.

For being brave enough to make such ground breaking films John Waters is my hero. I really wonder about his current career though. It's been a long time since he has made a new movie. As much as I want to see a new John Waters movie here is what I would really like to see. John Waters become the Steven Spielberg of exploitation films. Find awesome underground transgressive movies and slap "John Waters Presents" on them. It would be money in the bank and really help struggling no budget film makers out there.