Subject: John Waters
From: Klaus Ottmann (ko@thing.net)
Date: Fri Feb 18 2000 - 12:02:42 CST
I have to admit that I have never been a great fan of John Waters. The whole
Waters/Divine phenomena in the 70s and 80s kind of passed by me. I was in
Berlin and more fascinated by David Bowie's love affair with the Berlin
transvestite Romy Haag, by Rosa von Praunheim's movies, and of course, The
Rocky Picture Horror Show. Overall, however, I was really into "Lawrence of
Arabia" and Godard.
However, I don't want to be the kill-joy here. I am quite fascinated by
Water's book, particularly the following quote:
"To me, bad taste is what entertainment is all about. If someone vomits
watching one of my films, it's like getting a standing ovation. But one must
remember that there is such a thing as good bad taste and bad bad taste....
TO UNDERSTAND BAD TASTE ONE MUST HAVE VERY GOOD TASTE."
The thing is, I've never vomited watching any movie, not even during the
shit-eating sequences of Pasolini's "Sado" or any really bad porno flicks.
Actually, Waters's movies have too much good bad taste to evoke any deeper
reactions. He defines "good" as a "stylishness" and "originality."
Stylishness leads to a certain superficiality, which won't ever really let
the movie get inside your bowels; and originality is a debatable term
anyway.
I do cry a lot, watching movies, or occasionally come out of a movie deeply
distressed, even disturbed ("Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer" goes in the
latter category; I still believe that this movie is dangerous; it made me
think that I could be a serial killer, and as you all know, I 'm a very kind
person). At least, I do believe that Waters has genuine fun making his
movies, and is movies are funny at times. He did, after all, invent
"Smellorama." Now THAT was original.
Now how to get German Idealism into this?
Schelling writes that when, according to transcendental philosophy, the
SUBJECTIVE is the first and only ground of all reality, then we must begin
with a general doubt of objective reality. Waters's films are creating a
totally subjective reality, one that it is difficult to identify with, but
that also rejects everyday reality, or turns it upside-down. Schelling
further reminds us that there is the immediate certainty of the existence of
"things outside us," outside the subjective, but to him this certainty only
reaffirms or even creates the subjective I. In Waters's case, "us" is him,
and the things outside "him" are us, the audience, the movie viewers, who he
hopes will throw up watching his "reality" and thus affirm his subjectivity,
his subjective bad taste, which is good taste because it is the only real
taste, as there is no objective taste, according to Schelling.
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