One of John Waters first feature length films to achieve something more than a small distribution. ‘Multiple Maniacs’ Is raw, offensive and about as open and honest a film can be about its directors loves and influences…Sometimes to its own detriment.

The film follows ‘Lady Divine’ the operator of a ‘Sexual Circus’ freakshow that travels the nation showcasing freaks, geeks and sexually liberated misfits engaging in all MANNER of gross out awful things, that ramp up as the show progresses. This all culminates with ‘Divine’ herself appearing and basically robbing the audience under threat of mass murder.

After escaping from their latest ‘spree’ divine is informed that her lover has been seeing another woman on the side. This leads to a confrontation, some anal penetration, a resolution to murder her lover with her NEW lesbian lover…and a rape scene that…Im not going to describe here purely for how surreal the entire event really truely is (I dont wanna spoil THAT little encounter).

One of the things I love about this film, is also one of the things I feel holds it back terribly. The script itself is SUPER raw, incoherently raw, the ramblings of several drug addicts (and they WERE drug addicts at this point in time) made cinema.

The plot itself is quite basic, but the film cant keep focus on what it wants the audience to really ‘lock’ into and pay attention to. it’ll jutt off into extended scenes of Devine and Mink Stole talking about the stations of the cross and crucifixtion while divine gets Rosary beads inserted into places they shouldnt.

there are LONG LONG sequences of characters just talking border nonsense while lying in bed nude. it’s almost a certainty that these scenes exist to pad the runtime to feature length. But the script problems here run deeper than that. At times, it feels much less like a movie, and much more like a series of shots that John Waters had basically een stockpiling for debauched or debased things you ‘couldnt do on film’ at the time…presented one after another with about 15 minutes worth of story interconnecting them. As such, the act structuring is all over the place, the tone jumps all over the place between ‘Roughie’ cinema, French New Wave, Experimental art house, and at time, genuine B-movie exploitation.

This film makes a LOT more sense when you know what Waters was watching in theaters at the time, and what was influencing his film making, especially when the drug use is thrown into the mix. But the end result is still a deleriously messy production the likes of which ABSOLUTELY hadnt been seen before this point.

And of course, that isnt to say that the scripting is entirely awful. The debauched scenes Johns come up with here are hilarious, strange, deranged, and often quite cinematic and watchable. the dialogue feels incredibly strange andis hilarious for the most part…But given almost EVERYONE involved in this film WAS deeply troubled or strange. its always delivered so naturalistically and real. These people arnt actors in the traditional sense. Which again, only adds to the rawness and realness of the production.

Because of its rather ‘thrown together’ nature, it makes it a pitted film of peaks and troughs. the highs of this film are utterly delightful fun and exactly what I expect from a John Waters movie. The lows, had me drumming my fingers waiting for the fun to start again.

The direction is frantic, manic and high energy. The inexperience from Waters at this point lends the film a whole new dynamic, a sense of unpredictability, which in 1969/1970 must have been INCREDIBLY thrilling. Even now the sense of having NO idea what the hell is going to happen next is wonderfully compelling, and I imagine for people unfamiliar to ‘Waters’ Ouvre (Or people coming to this who’d only previously seen ‘Hairspray’) this must have been like having the switch flipped on an electric chair.

That being said, the gritty rawness of Waters directional choices does backfire at times, with some fairly long tracking shots causing a crashing pause to proceedings here and there, and the lack of understanding of framing resulting in some very interesting compositional choices, Some absolutely inspiring as an experimentation on the layout of a shot…But a lot of it feels ‘off’, and not in an intentional way…In a ‘not knowing what your filming or the point’ kind of way.

Direction of the cast is stiff. But thats a trait that carries through ALL of Johns movies. and its one I love quite dearly.

The cine is a mess, a vipers nest of quick cuts, mixed ability editing and badly composed/cropped sequences. Like I said earlier. When he gets onto a good thing, its an astounding work that pushes the boundaries of taste and decency to its limit resulting in some genuinely compelling cinema. When it misses. It feels like French New Wave cinema directed by Ray Dennis Steckler. That being said, Waters does nail the lighting for about 90% of this movie, getting a decent even coverage and exposure in most of his shots and some really nice natural light work makes the cast and locations really ‘pop’

The performances are 99% of the reason to watch a John Waters movie and this ones no exception. Divine RELISHES the opportunity to star in this thing, giving 110% from her first frame on scene to her last, something that would only ramp up even further as her career progressed. She’s a tinderbox in this film and as the movie goes on the fire only gets higher and higher. A fab performance both physically and in terms of her delivery.

Edith Massey delights as the local bar owner…it wasnt much of a stretch for Massey, given…she worked in a bar around this time. But its always delightful to see Miss Edie on screen. and I think her work heres great. The usual Waters ‘wrecking crew’ of Mink Stole, Cookie Mueller and David Lochary are all great fun here, though a little more subdued than their later appearences would be. they’re all still larger than life here, very animate, very vocal and very physcially keen to really get into the set space of the movie. Any movie this gang appear in almost always gets a BIG boost as a result.

And finally, the soundtrack. Which I cant really comment on here because the original score has had to be replaced with a ‘copyright friendly’ version for the criterion Bluray…But…its fine, its basically a jukebox mix of 50s and early 60s bops. It helps act as a nice ‘squeaky clean’ contrast to this movies darkest perversions. I had a soft spot for it.

I adore ‘Multiple Maniacs’ enthusiasm and utter relishment for the disgusting, the depraved and the morally questionable. However, it really does feel like a film where the film makers had waited so long to make a ‘go’ on the whole ‘get a film out there’ thing. that they just…threw EVERYTHING they possibly could at the screen without even pausing for a second to review and refine the work they were making. As a result it feels more like a disjointed series of events rather than a coherent work. a test run of things that do and dont work in the medium of film.

While I do have a soft spot for the film overall, its a bit TOO incoherent for me. and I found myself just kind of waiting for a point to arrive…which it never did…leaving me just kind of bewildered in a good way…but ultimately non plussed.

Absolutely recommended if you like the works of John Waters, This one isnt one I regularly revisit. But I still kind of dig it all the same.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/multiple-maniacs/1/