Polyester is a 1981 American John Waters comedy film starring Divine, Tab Hunter, Edith Massey, and Mink Stole. It was filmed in Waters' native Baltimore, Maryland, and features a gimmick called "Odorama", whereby viewers could smell what they saw on screen through scratch and sniff cards.
The film is a satire of suburban life involving divorce, abortion, adultery, alcoholism, foot fetishism, and the Religious Right.
Plot
Polyester tells the story of housewife Francine Fishpaw (Divine), whose life is crumbling around her in her upper middle class suburban Baltimore home. Her husband, Elmer (David Samson), is a polyester-clad lout who owns an X-rated theater, causing anti-pornography protesters to picket the Fishpaws' house. She also states that "All the neighborhood women spit at me" whenever she is at the Shopping Mall. Francine's children are Lu-Lu (Mary Garlington), her spoiled, slutty daughter, and Dexter (Ken King), her delinquent, glue-sniffing son who derives illicit pleasure from stomping on women's feet. Also adding to Francine's troubles is her snobby, cocaine-snorting mother, La Rue (Joni Ruth White), who robs Francine blind and only cares about her "valuable shopping time."
Francine seeks solace in her best friend, Cuddles Kovinsky (Edith Massey), an independently wealthy, simple-minded woman and the world's oldest debutante. Cuddles was once the Fishpaws' housekeeper, but she has inherited a large sum of money from a very affluent family that she used to work for and befriended Francine. This infuriates Francine's class-conscious mother, who admonishes Francine, "She was a scrubwoman. Give her...a ham at Easter, but for God's sake, don't hang around with her!" Cuddles tries to cheer up Francine with "seize-the-day" bromides, to no avail.
Francine discovers that her husband is having an affair with his secretary, Sandra Sullivan (Mink Stole), and later confronts them during a tryst at a motel and demands a divorce. Francine then falls into alcoholism and depression, exacerbated by her children's behavior: Lu-lu becomes pregnant with her delinquent boyfriend Bobo (Stiv Bators)'s child and announces to her mother, "I'm having an abortion, and I can't wait!"; and after Dexter is arrested at a supermarket for stomping on a woman's foot, the media reveal he's the "Baltimore foot stomper".
Lu-Lu goes to family planning clinic for an abortion, but is harassed by anti-abortion picketers. She flees, goes home, and tries to induce a miscarriage, causing Francine to call an unwed mothers' home. Two nuns arrive, cart Lu-Lu out of the house, lock her in the trunk of a car, and whisk her off to a Catholic home for unwed mothers.
Meanwhile, on Halloween evening, La Rue is shot by Bobo and his friend, who have come to trash the Fishpaw house. La Rue manages to retrieve the gun and shoots Bobo dead. Lu-Lu comes home from the unwed mothers' home and, upon discovering her dead boyfriend, tries to commit suicide by sticking her head in the oven. Francine comes home, sees her daughter's suicide attempt, and faints.
After this, Francine's life begins to change. Dexter is released from jail, completely rehabilitated. Lu-Lu suffers a miscarriage from her suicide attempt and sees the error of her ways, turning from a high-school harlot to an artistic flower child who enthuses, "Look mother, I've discovered macramé!". Francine finally summons the strength to tell off La Rue. A beacon of light arrives in the form of lounge-suit-wearing, Corvette-driving Todd Tomorrow (Tab Hunter), lifting Francine's spirits. Todd proposes marriage to an elated Francine, who accepts.
However, it is soon revealed that Todd is romantically involved with La Rue and they are conspiring to embezzle Francine's divorce settlement and drive her insane. Meanwhile, Elmer and Sandra break into the house to kill Francine, but are felled by Dexter and Lu-Lu (Dexter steps on Sandra's foot, causing her to accidentally shoot Elmer; Lu-Lu uses her macramé to strangle Sandra.) Cuddles and her German chauffeur/fiancé Heintz (Hans Kramm) arrive on the scene and strike La Rue and Todd with their limousine. The film concludes with a happy ending for Francine, her children, and Cuddles and Heintz.
Cast
Dreamlanders
Waters' usual troupe of actors, the Dreamlanders, played minor roles in Polyester compared to Waters' previous films Desperate Living, Female Trouble, and Pink Flamingos, which starred several Dreamlanders in major roles. Only two Dreamlanders, Divine and Edith Massey, received top billing in Polyester. Dreamlander perennials Mink Stole, Mary Vivian Pearce, Cookie Mueller, Sharon Niesp, Marina Melin, Susan Lowe, and Jean Hill each played small roles in Polyester. While their parts are integral to the plot, they are much smaller compared to their earlier roles.
Polyester was the first of Waters' movies to skirt the mainstream, even garnering an R rating (his previous films were all unrated or rated X). The film was set in a middle-class suburb of Baltimore instead of its slums and bohemian neighborhoods (the setting of Waters' earlier films).
"Women’s pictures"
Polyester was meant as a send-up of “women’s pictures,” an exploitative genre of film that was popular from the 1950s-60s and typically featured bored, unfulfilled, or otherwise troubled women, usually middle-aged suburban housewives, finding release or escape through the arrival of a handsome younger man. “Women’s pictures” were typically hackneyed B-movies, but Waters specifically styled Polyester after the work of the director Douglas Sirk, making use of similar lighting and editing techniques, even using film equipment and movie-making techniques from Sirk's era.[citation needed]
Odorama
Odors, especially Francine's particularly keen sense of smell, play an important role in the film. To highlight this, Waters designed Odorama, a "scratch-and-sniff" gimmick inspired by the work of William Castle and the 1960 film Scent of Mystery, which featured a device called Smell-O-Vision. Special cards with spots numbered 1 through 10 were distributed to audience members before the show, in the manner of 3D glasses. When a number flashed on the screen, viewers were to scratch and sniff the appropriate spot. Smells included the scent of flowers, pizza, glue, gas, grass, and feces.
After being prompted to scratch and sniff the bouquet of flowers, a quick swap was made substituting old ratty sneakers, resulting in a joke on the audience.
A video version of the film omits the numbers flashing onscreen as well as the opening introduction explaining Odorama. This version, created by Lorimar Telepictures, was shown on cable TV in the United States.
In 1999, the Independent Film Channel released reproduction Odorama cards for John Waters film festivals.
In the commentary track on the film's 2004 DVD release, Waters expressed his delight at having the film's audiences actually "pay to smell shit".
Critical response
Polyester received some good reviews from the mainstream press. Said Janet Maslin of the New York Times:
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Ordinarily, Mr. Waters is not everyone's cup of tea - but Polyester, which opens today at the National and other theaters, is not Mr. Waters' ordinary movie. It's a very funny one, with a hip, stylized humor that extends beyond the usual limitations of his outlook. This time, the comic vision is so controlled and steady that Mr. Waters need not rely so heavily on the grotesque touches that make his other films such perennial favorites on the weekend Midnight Movie circuit. Here's one that can just as well be shown in the daytime. |
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Songs used in film
- "Polyester" - Tab Hunter - Words and music by Chris Stein and Debbie Harry
- "Be My Daddy's Baby (Lu-Lu's theme)" - Michael Kamen - Words and music by Debbie Harry and Michael Kamen
- "The Best Thing" - Bill Murray - Words and music by Debbie Harry and Michael Kamen
External links
