John Waters' 'Hairspray' celebrated the rejected

Rikki Lake stars as Tracy in the 1988 cult favorite, “Hairspray.” (New Line Pictures/MovieStillsDB.com)

Ultimate Movie Year finds the best released films from weekends past to build an all-star lineup of cinema.

"Hairspray"
Released Feb. 26, 1988
Directed by John Waters

The most joyful and exhilarating experience we have as film fans is discovering a new movie destined to be a cult classic. These aren't the movies that make hundreds of millions at the theater or generate weeks of social media posts and think pieces afterward, but the ones that aren't on anybody's radar but yours and maybe a few dozen people like yourself. 

They're not meant to be loved by mass audiences, and are almost always rejected by them initially. But they're weird, or funny, or scary in a way you haven't experienced before. For some reason, you can get on the film's wavelength, causing you to love it in a way you can't explain. Maybe you find a couple more people who are fans too, and it makes it even more exhilarating because these small groups of people have discovered this golden weirdo treasure that nobody else knows about. We go to screenings to experience it as a group, and we'll make inside jokes about the movie that signifies we're all part of an exclusive club that everybody else is missing out on. It's a special feeling to love the rejected, so it goes without saying that it takes a unique filmmaker to make a cult movie specifically about celebrating the rejected. John Waters is that filmmaker, and "Hairspray" is that film.

The 1988 film by John Waters takes us back to 1962 Baltimore, filled with teenagers who only cared about clothes, music, dancing, and sex. Tracy Turnblad (Ricki Lake) and her friend Penny (Leslie Ann Powers) watch and groove to "The Corny Collins Show," a local television dance program. Tracy dreams of being on the show herself. When an opportunity to audition comes up, she impresses nearly everybody with her dancing skills. Tracy also finds herself in the Miss Auto Show competition with her rival and classmate, Amber Von Tussle. While Tracy's presence on the television show continues to help her grow in popularity, she can't help but begin to notice who's not allowed on the program as the station's owners prohibit allowing black people on "Corny Collins" outside of the once a month "Negro Day" hosted by Motormouth Maybell.

What's unique about Tracy is that she's an overweight teenage girl, while all the other dancers look more conventional. Tracy's size never personally bothers her, and her self-confidence not only helps get her cast on "Corny Collins," it also lands her a modeling job at a plus-size local clothing store. The matter of Tracy's weight is not the focus of those around her, or at least not specifically; once she colors and changes her hairstyle, she draws much more scrutiny from others for her appearance. Whether the characters of "Hairspray" were more accepting of overweight people or they didn't find it socially acceptable to target others like that, Waters centering the movie around Tracy is a subversive act of defiance not only in society but in Hollywood. The industry tends to banish any women over a size 2 from sight, so Ricki Lake's performance and confidence as Tracy is a refreshing change of pace from the usual.

But while society may judge the overweight, its treatment of black Americans is worse. When viewing "Hairspray" for the first time, it's easy to think that the story will be about Tracy's weight. When auditioning to be on "The Corny Collins Show," Tracy glances at a black couple who is thrown out of the studio by a security guard. Shortly after that, Tracy is rejected by her teacher in school and transferred into the Special Education class, where the administration tends to put all of their black students. The story of the movie now starts to come into focus, as Tracy connects more and more to her black friends. She finds their treatment deplorable, and puts her opportunity for the Miss Auto Show crown at risk after she protests for "Integration, not segregation!"

While Tracy and the black characters of "Hairspray" actively fought for equality in the story, Waters casually included it onscreen as well. Divine, a notable gay drag performer who rose to fame by appearing in the director's previous films, plays Tracy's mother. Divine's performance as Edna is effective in its normalcy, as the other characters never acknowledge anything about her is unusual. Once again, Waters uses his cast and story to showcase people who are typically rejected, diminished, or invisible in Hollywood movies, and those who oppose the lead characters are the freaks and weirdoes. Divine fully embraced the ethos, as he also plays the racist television station owner Arvin Hodgepile.

It's hard to imagine another director crafting this story with such a specific look and feel other than Waters. A native of Baltimore who began making films at a young age, Waters had a vision that combined high art with low taste, pushing the limits of audiences and censors with movies like "Pink Flamingos" and "Female Trouble" that starred Divine, his childhood friend. While "Hairspray" is a more mainstream effort by Waters, its theme is still subversive. Along with Production Designer Vincent Pernanio and Costume Designer Van Smith, Waters took great care in developing a colorful but accurate period look, taking audiences back to what was presumably a simpler time for some. The introduction of racial segregation coming a little bit later into the film undercuts the perfect memories of the early 60s with the unspoken injustice lying beneath. As Tracy builds upon her friendship with Maybelle, Seaweed, and others, she learns that many of the dancing moves she's gained were learned from black dancers. Black artists influenced the music she hears. In fact, much of "The Corny Collins Show" was born in black culture, and the originators are relegated to one appearance per month. Nobody is going to consider "Hairspray" to be a realistic and grounded account of race relations in the early 60s, but that's not the point. It's a light and fun movie in which at least these issues are visible. As a gay man, Waters has the perspective of living without the equality, rights, and respect given to the majority, and therefore brings truth and righteousness, along with style and panache, to the rejected and ignored members of society as they turn the tables in "Hairspray."

The theme of focusing on societal rejects had a unique meta quality in 1988, as movie audiences largely ignored "Hairspray" during its original theatrical run, grossing only $6 million. However, it continued to grow a following after its video release, winning more and more fans with its fun and happy story of equality. Critics also championed "Hairspray" whenever they could, and the movie became one of the most beloved cult movies of all time. Its legacy was secured when a Broadway musical based on the movie premiered in 2002, followed by a film adaptation of the musical in 2007, and even a live television production was performed in 2016. "Hairspray" won its battle of integration into the culture.

While there are cult movies of many different genres, the one commonality I find among them is the passion and ambition these filmmakers bring to the table. Making a movie is incredibly hard even with the support of a major film studio. Still, for many of these cult movies made with small crews and lower budgets, their path to success depends on the drive of the director that has a vision and story to tell, and they are the only ones who can say it. John Waters definitely qualifies, and "Hairspray" is the climax.

The Weekend: As we close out February and head into March, the temperature for new releases at theaters tends to cool down. There are many smaller movies that saw release during this period, some of which have created passionate fans over the years, but there are no huge moneymakers or award-winning pictures in the mix. It's a relatively quiet weekend. 

The lone exception that proves this rule is 1965's "The Sound of Music," the blockbuster musical starring Julie Andrews that won the Academy Award for Best Picture. The film is one of the last celebrated musicals and epic that marked Hollywood's golden period, before the new generation of filmmakers who exploded in the late 60s and early 70s. Director Robert Wise also won the Academy Award for Best Directing for this and his prior work, 1961's "West Side Story," but for my money, there's a better musical than both of them coming up later in the Ultimate Movie Year.

This weekend also boasts the release of the funniest comedy of 1984. No, it's not "Ghostbusters" (which was released in June of that year), but Rob Reiner's "This Is Spinal Tap." The mock-rockumentary about the fictional British rock band Spinal Tap on the downslope of their relevancy, the movie features stellar work by stars Michael McKean, Christopher Guest, and Harry Shearer. It's easily one of the funniest movies ever made, so why wouldn't this be the choice for the week? As a director, Reiner is behind several stone-cold classics, including "When Harry Met Sally," which proved to be a better fit for later in the year. Besides, "This is Spinal Tap" helped inspired Guest's own career behind mockumentaries like 2000's "Best in Show," and next week's entry is also a contender for funniest film ever, so I'm personally beyond comfortable with this choice.

John Hughes was also one of the most successful filmmakers of the 80s, and he wrote the screenplays for two teenage romances released in succeeding years, with both directed by Howard Deutch. 1986's "Pretty in Pink" featured Hughes muse Molly Ringwald stuck in the middle of a romantic triangle between Andrew McCarthy and Jon Cryer is a sentimental favorite that spanned the hit song by Orchestral Manoeuvers in the Dark's "If You Leave." The gender dynamic was flipped in 1987's "Some Kind of Wonderful" with Eric Stoltz debating his pursuit of Lea Thompson or longtime friend Mary Stewart Masterson. Both would have been solid choices in a quiet week, though "Pretty in Pink" has aged problematically. Oddly enough, Deutch ended up the winner of all the romantic drama here as he ended up marrying Thompson after filming, a union that borne Zoey Deutch. 

Another reliable choice for the week is 2007's "Zodiac." Directed by David Fincher and starring Robert Downey Jr., Mark Ruffalo, and Jake Gyllenhaal, the movie dramatizes the pursuit of the Zodiac Killer through the eyes of three newspaper reporters. Fincher masters the art of building tension and anxiety throughout the film as the killer's dark shadow invades the minds and souls of the principal characters, so in another year, this could have been the pick for the Ultimate Movie Year. But then Fincher had to go and make the best movie of the 2010s, "The Social Network," so "Zodiac" will have to settle for a strong recommendation this time.

Other notable films released this weekend include Sally Field's 1979 union drama, "Norma Rae," Sean Connery and Alec Baldwin starring in novelist Tom Clancy's first film adaptation, 1990's "The Hunt for Red October," Oliver Stone dramatizing the life of Jim Morrison in 1991's "The Doors," Al Pacino mentoring secret informant Johnny Depp in the mob drama "Donnie Brasco" from 1997, Paul Thomas Anderson's 1997 directorial debut "Hard Eight," Jim Jarmusch's cult film "Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai" from 1999, Mel Gibson's controversial "The Passion of the Christ" from 2004, and Hugh Jackman's farewell performance as Wolverine in 2017's "Logan."

This is definitely a weekend with a few great movies disqualified because their directors were spotlighted elsewhere, and other memorable films that nevertheless couldn't make an undeniable case for the Ultimate Movie Year. "Hairspray" is a movie that stands as a peer with the best of the qualifying options, but thanks to Waters' unique perspective and vision, made it the most exciting choice for the weekend.

Next Week: "The Big Lebowski"

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