John Waters Filmography

Squeezebox!

Synopsis: In the mid-1990's, when Rudy Guiliani took over as mayor of New York City, he began a campaign to clean up the city, shutting down many of New York's sex clubs and wilder nightspots while turning the Times Square area into a Disney-friendly tourist destination. However, not every New Yorker was Read More

Jack Smith & The Destruction of Atlantis

Actors: Ari Roussimoff, Andrew Sarris, Ela Troyano, Billy Name, Agosto Machado

Synopsis: The underground art of renegade performance artist, photographer, and filmmaker Jack Smith is explored through the images he created and the words of those who knew him best in filmmaker Mary Jordan's tribute to the man believed to have inspired some of Andy Warhol's most iconic works. A virulent Read More

Spine Tingler: The William Castle Story

Actors: John Waters, Terry Castle, John Landis, Roger Corman, Joe Dante

Synopsis: Over the course of a Hollywood career that spanned five decades, William Castle directed dozens of movies and earned a reputation as a clever hand with a low-budget thriller, but the movies he made aren't always as well remembered as the way he sold them to the public. During the Fifties and Read More

In the Land of Merry Misfits

Synopsis: The Keven Undergaro-written and directed, Maria Menounos-produced comedy In the Land of Merry Misfits concerns a college graduate who slips into a colorful netherworld populated by twisted and warped versions of innocent fairy tales, and underdogs embarking on quixotic errands. To achieve his goal Read More

Obscene

Actors: Barney Rosset, Amiri Baraka, Jim Carroll, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Al Goldstein

Synopsis: To countless avant-garde belletrists, filmmakers and playwrights, publisher Barney Rosset - proprietor of the legendary Grove Press - qualifies as an undisputed hero. Via scores of in-court legal battles, Rosset fought aggressively and valiantly to defend the release of works as varied as William Read More

Jackass: Number Two

Actors: Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O, Chris Pontius, Ryan Dunn

Synopsis: For fans who thought the stakes couldn't be raised any higher and the bar couldn't be lowered any further, the original cast and crew of the stunt comedy sensation that swept the globe return for another round of jaw-dropping feats that are guaranteed to have viewers wincing through their Read More

This Film Is Not Yet Rated

Actors: Kimberly Peirce, Alison Andres, Jon Lewis, David Ansen, Martin Garbus, Wayne Kramer

Synopsis: In a rare and refreshing reversal of roles, filmmakers put the powerful Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA for short) under the microscope for inspection in Academy Award-nominated director Kirby Dick's incisive look at stateside cinema's most notorious non-censoring censors. Compelled by Read More

That Man: Peter Berlin

Synopsis: As the hedonism of the '70s reached a fever-pitch, few gay porn stars achieved the stratospheric level of success as Night in Black Leather and That Boy star Peter Berlin. In filmmaker Jim Tushinski's insightful documentary tracing the career of the boyish gay icon, interviews with famous friends Read More

Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea

Synopsis: As co-directed by Jeff Springer and Chris Metzler, the documentary Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea travels to the titular body of water for an idiosyncratic look at a decidedly odd locale. An inland ocean with a close proximity to the urban areas of southern California, the Salton once Read More

I, of the Cyclops

Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema

Actors: Todd Haynes, Ang Lee, Jennie Livingston, Heather Matarazzo, John Cameron Mitchell

Synopsis: Gay, lesbian, and transgender filmmakers, actors, and critics explore the history of queer cinema in this made-for-cable documentary. Eschewing any overarching narration, co-directors Lesli Klainberg and Lisa Ades illustrate archival footage and film clips with dozens of interviews. They also Read More

This Filthy World

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: John Waters

Synopsis: In this filmed version of cult film director John Waters' popular one-man show, the Pink Flamingos and A Dirty Shame director takes the stage to discuss everything from his early influences, fondest career memories, and notorious struggles against the MPAA rating system. Part endearing memoir and Read More

Inside Deep Throat

Synopsis: Directors Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato follow up Party Monster by returning to the documentary form of their most popular film The Eyes of Tammy Faye. Rather than examining evangelists-cum-gay icons, this time the duo takes aim at the cultural phenomenon that is and was Deep Throat, the Read More

Midnight Movies: From the Margin to the Mainstream

Synopsis: Stuart Samuels's popular documentary Midnight Movies: From Margin to Mainstream grounds itself in the thesis that six revolutionary American motion pictures - Night of the Living Dead (1968), El Topo (1970), Pink Flamingoes (1972), The Harder they Come (1972), The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) Read More

Seed of Chucky

Actors: Brad Dourif, Jennifer Tilly, Billy Boyd, Redman, Hannah Spearritt

Synopsis: When the notoriously evil Chucky doll and his lover gave birth, they had no idea that their spawn would grow up to be a peace-loving kind of guy; however, that's exactly what Glen turns out to be: a gentle soul who is horrified at what he has been told about his family. After hearing the news of a Read More

A Dirty Shame

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Tracey Ullman, Johnny Knoxville, Selma Blair, Chris Isaak, Suzanne Shepherd

Synopsis: America's leading titan of bad taste, John Waters, returns to X-rated territory (well, actually NC-17-rated territory, but you get the idea) for this wildly over-the-top comedy. Sylvia Stickles (Tracey Ullman) is a wife and mother living in Baltimore who, along with her husband Vaughn (Chris Read More

Hollywood High

Synopsis: This exhaustively researched cable-TV documentary traces the history of drug movies, from camp classics like Reefer Madness to more serious and sober examinations like Requiem for a Dream. Top-heavy with clips from such once-shocking groundbreakers as The Man With the Golden Arm, the "head" flicks Read More

The O.C.: Premiere

Synopsis: The initial seven-week "test run" of The O.C. starts with a bang in this debut episode. The main focus is on Ryan Atwood (Ben McKenzie), a tough, trouble-prone teen who has been arrested for stealing a car and thrown out of his Chino home, seemingly headed inexorably toward a life of crime. Read More

Art: 21: Art in the Twenty-First Century, Program 5 - Stories

Blood Feast 2: All U Can Eat

Actors: J. P. Delahoussaye, John "Spud" McConnell, Mark McLachlan, Toni Wynne, Kristi Polit

Synopsis: Herschell Gordon Lewis and David F. Friedman, the director/producer team who made exploitation film history in the early 1960s with their then-daring "nudie cuties" and later the first "gore" films, return to the scene of their most infamous project with this sequel, which marked their first Read More

Cecil B. Demented

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Melanie Griffith, Stephen Dorff, Alicia Witt, Lawrence Gilliard, Jr., Maggie Gyllenhaal

Synopsis: Iconoclastic satirist John Waters bites the hand that (periodically) feeds him in this humorous look at the underside of the film industry. Self-styled guerrilla filmmaker Cecil (Stephen Dorff) leads a Baltimore movie-making collective/street gang called the Sprocket Holes, which includes Cecil's Read More

Conversations in World Cinema: John Waters

FilmFest, Vol. 5

Pie in the Sky: The Brigid Berlin Story

Actors: Brigid Berlin, John Waters, Patricia Hearst, Paul Morrissey, Taylor Mead

Synopsis: Like Susanne Ofteringer's Nico-Icon (1995), Vincent Fremont's Pie in the Sky: The Brigid Berlin Story chronicles the life of one of the more colorful and unforgettable women to emerge from Andy Warhol's menagerie of artists, actors, lost souls, and hangers-on. The daughter of wealthy, powerful Read More

Sweet and Lowdown

Actors: Sean Penn, Samantha Morton, Uma Thurman, Brian Markinson, Anthony LaPaglia, Woody Allen

Synopsis: Woody Allen immerses himself in the world of vintage jazz in this period mock-biography of a musician gifted in his art but a sad student in life. Emmet Ray (Sean Penn) is a 1930s jazz guitarist considered one of the finest musicians ever to touch a fretboard, second only to the legendary Django Read More

Forever Hollywood

Actors: Sharon Stone, Warren Beatty, Annette Bening, Jeff Bridges, André De Toth

Synopsis: Chief film critic of Variety and director of the acclaimed Visions of Light (1993), Todd McCarthy spins this love letter to tinseltown. Funded in part by the city of Los Angeles, the film charts Hollywood's rapid evolution from a sleepy town to a gleaming center of glamour in the 1950s to its Read More

Pecker

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Edward Furlong, Christina Ricci, Mary Kay Place, Martha Plimpton, Brendan Sexton, Jr.

Synopsis: John Waters wrote and directed this $6.5 million satire on the Manhattan art world, a rags-to-riches comedy about 18-year-old amateur photographer Pecker (so named because he pecks at his food). Pecker (Edward Furlong) is a blue-collar kid who works in a Baltimore sandwich shop and takes snapshots Read More

Frasier: The Maris Counselor

Synopsis: Desperately seeking to patch things up with his estranged (and never-seen) wife Maris, Niles (David Hyde Pierce) has been seeing a new marriage counselor, Dr. Schenckman (Bob Dishy). The good doc suggests that Niles spice up his marriage with a little "spontaneity." Alas, Niles' efforts to follow Read More

Divine Trash

Actors: John Waters, Jeanine Basinger, Steve Buscemi, Ken Jacobs

Synopsis: A documentary profile of filmmaker John Waters, Divine Trash focuses on the bad-taste pioneer's early years, especially his 1972 breakthrough Pink Flamingos, which turned the director of Mondo Trasho and Multiple Maniacs into the king of midnight movies thanks to word of mouth about the film's Read More

Anthem

Actors: Robert Redford, Michael Stipe, Studs Terkel, Winona Laduke, George McGovern

Synopsis: Two young women travel across the country in an old Saab armed with Hi-8 cameras, experience as Hollywood production assistants and a strong desire to capture the true character and spirit of the American people. Their journey leads Kristin Hahn and Shainee Gabel to interview a wide variety of Read More

Serial Mom

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Kathleen Turner, Sam Waterston, Ricki Lake, Matthew Lillard, Mary Jo Catlett

Synopsis: Beverly Sutphin (Kathleen Turner) is the perfect suburban housewife and mother. She likes to cook, her home is immaculately clean, she's always well-groomed and cheerful, and she loves her husband Eugene (Sam Waterston) and her two children, Misty (Ricki Lake) and Chip (Matthew Lillard). There's Read More

Cry-Baby

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Johnny Depp, Amy Locane, Susan Tyrrell, Polly Bergen, Iggy Pop, Ricki Lake

Synopsis: John Waters does a quirky spin on '50s nostalgia in Cry-Baby, his musical homage to Rebel Without a Cause and Romeo and Juliet. Set in Baltimore in 1954 at the birth of rock & roll, the film features Johnny Depp as Wade "Cry-Baby" Walker. Depp is pure charisma as a juvenile delinquent with a Read More

Which Way Home

Synopsis: The made-for-cable film Which Way Home is the story of a Red Cross nurse trying to escape from war-torn Cambodia in the late '70s with a group of orphans. An Australian smuggler assists her in her valiant attempt to save the children and leave Asia. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide Read More

Divine

Crew: Director

Synopsis: John Waters offers his personal tribute to the multi-talented Divine, a comic actor best known for his female impersonation, with these two short films, "The Diane Linkletter Story" and "The Neon Woman," featuring a seldom-seen filmization of one of Divine's life performances. ~ Sandra Brennan Read More

Homer and Eddie

Actors: James Belushi, Whoopi Goldberg, Karen Black, John Waters, Beah Richards, Robert Glaudini

Synopsis: Director Andrei Konchalovsky comes a cropper with this mawkish road movie starring Whoopi Goldberg and James Belushi. Goldberg plays Edwina, an escaped mental patient with a brain tumor and only a month to live. Belushi is Homer, a retarded man abandoned by his parents when he was a child after a Read More

Hairspray

Crew: Co-producer, Director, Screen Story, Screenwriter

Actors: Ricki Lake, Michael St. Gerard, Divine, Colleen Fitzpatrick, Sonny Bono, Ruth Brown

Synopsis: Forever interested in the kitsch built into past eras, director John Waters chooses the TV dance show craze of the early '60s for his playful focus in Hairspray. Ricki Lake plays Tracy Turnblad, just one of several alliteratively named characters coming of age in 1962 Baltimore, where "The Corny Read More

Brains by Revlon

Crew: Director

Synopsis: Three women participate in a conversation. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

Divine Waters

Synopsis: A documentary video that features the life and career of John Waters, the director of cult films like Pink Flamingos and Polyester. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

Polyester

Crew: Director, Producer, Screen Story, Screenwriter

Actors: Divine, Tab Hunter, Edith Massey, Mink Stole, David Samson

Synopsis: After making a name for himself with such underground gross-out epics as Pink Flamingos and Desperate Living, director John Waters made a bid for somewhat wider acceptance with this black comedy, which is sedate only by the standards of his previous work. Francine Fishpaw (Divine) is a housewife Read More

It's Clean, It Just Looks Dirty

Synopsis: This delightful performance video features works by conductor/composer Philip Glass, musician David Byrne, and filmmaker John Waters. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

Desperate Living

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Liz Renay, Mink Stole, Susan Lowe, Edith Massey, Mary Vivian Pearce

Synopsis: Divine was touring as a cabaret singer when director John Waters made this comedy of the grotesque, but he filled the void admirably with the equally rotund Jean Hill and burlesque-queen Liz Renay. The film tells the story of Peggy Gravel (Mink Stole), a mad housewife who kills her husband then Read More

Female Trouble

Crew: Cinematographer, Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Divine, David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce, Mink Stole, Edith Massey

Synopsis: A riotously funny bad-taste epic from director John Waters, Baltimore's "Prince of Puke," this sick classic tells the depraved life story of obese criminal Dawn Davenport (Divine), from her bad-girl youth as a go-go dancer on Baltimore's infamous Block to her death in the electric chair. Mink Stole Read More

Pink Flamingos

Crew: Cinematographer, Director, Editor, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Divine, David Lochary, Mink Stole, Mary Vivian Pearce, Edith Massey

Synopsis: Renegade filmmaker and noted aficionado of expressive bad taste John Waters exploded into international infamy with this darkly comic, no-budget parade of the perverse (his third feature film, and first in color), in which plus-size cross-dresser Divine stars as Babs Johnson, a flashy criminal on Read More

Multiple Maniacs

Crew: Director, Editor, Screenwriter

Actors: Divine

Synopsis: Another effort from notoriously tasteless duo John Waters and Divine, Multiple Maniacs finds heavyweight transvestite Divine as the maniacal head of a group of murderous kidnappers. Bent on ridding society of it's most boring element, suburbanites, Divine and company tour under the guise of Read More

Mondo Trasho

Crew: Cinematographer, Director, Editor, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Divine, David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce

Synopsis: The first feature film directed by self-proclaimed "Prince of Puke" John Waters, this black-and-white, mostly silent comedy cost just 2000 dollars. Mondo Trasho looks its budget, but has some amusing moments as it tells the story of a woman (Mary Vivian Pearce) who has a very bad day. First, she Read More

Eat Your Make Up!

Crew: Director, Editor

Synopsis: The movie with which future shock mega-star John Waters graduated to 16mm film, this third short from the "Prince of Puke" features a maniacal couple who kidnap young girls, forcing them to perform the titular duties before modeling themselves to death. Never shown commercially following it's Read More

Roman Candles

Crew: Director

Synopsis: The sophomore effort by John Waters and first collaboration between the director and legendary drag queen Divine, Roman Candles presents a random sampling of images relating to The Wizard of Oz, sex, drugs and religion. Set against an equally random sampling of audio bytes of radio advertisements Read More

Hag in a Black Leather Jacket

Crew: Director

Synopsis: The freshman effort by future schlock and shock superstar John Waters, Hag in a Black Leather Jacket tells the bold tale of interracial romance during a time of heightened racial tensions. Shown only once in public, the black and white, seventeen-minute-long short features a surreal marriage Read More