John Waters in SLO, March 14th. (Film Festival)

[pinto]

Pink flamingos riding on dandelion dust

The San Luis Obispo International Film Festival gets surreal, poignant, and questionably tasteful.

by Ashley Schwellenbach (New Times)



The San Luis Obispo International Film Festival is a space where movies matter, be they such tried-and-true classics as Some Like It Hot and Roman Holiday, locally produced gems including The Happy People and The Bike Happening, or a film that will plunge you into a new world in another country, like Amal and A Thousand Oceans. From March 6-15, the festival will breathe cinematic life into spaces not often inhabited by film, including Cal Poly, Corbett Vineyards, Santa Margarita Ranch, La Perla Del Mar, and Downtown Brewing Company, as well as celebrating the art form within its more customary habitation—the Palm Theatre, Downtown Center Cinema, the Fremont Theatre, and Paso Robles’ Park Cinemas.

Besides the dozens of screenings, the festival will feature King Vidor Award recipient Malcolm McDowell in a March 6 award ceremony, the ever-popular surf night on March 12, and the independent film awards including John Waters on March 14.

Filmmaker, author, actor, and general ne’er-do-well, John Waters will be performing his one-man show, “This Filthy World,” on March 14 at 7:30 p.m. at the Fremont Theatre. Tickets cost $35, $30 for students and film society members. The Baltimore resident’s projects include Eat Your Makeup (1968), Mondo Trasho (1969), Pink Flamingos (1972), Hairspray (1988), and Cry-Baby (1990), among many, many productions. He is perhaps best known for repeatedly featuring the same performers, including Divine, Mary Vivian Pearce, Patricia Hearst, and Edith Massey, alongside such better known actors as Johnny Depp and Christina Ricci. He happily cultivates a reputation for making campy, quirky, and peculiar films, exploring the possibilities of “good bad taste” in a manner that only those with extremely good taste can do. Waters took the time to discuss his good taste, a lobster rape scene, and his near arrest in San Luis Obispo with New Times.

(interview with Waters at)

http://www.newtimesslo.com/cover/2053/pink-flamingos-riding-on-dandelion-dust/