Made two years after Pink Flamingos, Waters once again cast transvestite superstar Divine in the lead role in his next film, 1974's Female Trouble, once again filmed on the mean streets of Waters' hometown, Baltimore, Maryland. This time around, Divine was cast in the role of teenaged girl Dawn Davenport. When we first meet Ms. Davenport she's a bratty schoolgirl who drops out of class after snapping when she finds out that her parents didn't buy her the cha-cha heels she wanted for Christmas. This leads to an amazing exchange with her mother resulting in a whole lot of quotable dialogue highlighted by:

Get off me... lay off me! I hate you, f*ck you! F*ck you both, you awful people! You're not my parents! I hate you, I hate this house, and I hate Christmas!

All this over shoes! At any rate, we know early one that Dawn is a little unstable. She leaves home and hits the road looking to do her own thing free of parental control. She ends up being sexually assaulted by an older man, and nine months later she gives birth to her daughter, Taffy (Mink Stole), who soon brings with her a whole new set of problems. Dawn winds up marrying a hairstylist whose mother, Ida (Edith Massey), thinks is gay. His name is Gator (Michael Potter) and he works at the Lipstick Salon. This exclusive beauty parlor is run by Donald (David Lochary who died of a drug overdose shortly after the film was completed) and Donna (Mary Vivian Pearce) Dasher, a couple that soon becomes enamored with Dawn's criminal lifestyle. In fact, they become even more excited by her when they witness the more 'white trash' and 'criminal' aspects of her life unfolding in front of their very eyes. They soon start taking pictures of her and convince her that they'll make her a star, encouraging her wild behavior to shine in front of their camera lens. Soon though, it all goes too far and the cops get wise to Dawn's antics. It's then that she descends further and further into insanity.

If only she'd gotten those cha-cha heels for Christmas.

Loaded with more Charles Manson references, an obvious anti-social slant, and another fantastic performance from Divine, Female Trouble works exceptionally well in the context of Waters' filthy world. While Pink Flamingos was pretty hard to top for shock value (though Female Trouble has its moments and comes pretty damn close…Divine and the fish…ewwwww), this later film has a better vibe in that it's paced better, the humor is funnier and much sharper, and the movie just flows better. Waters' natural and gleefully offensive wit is fully developed and the satire is poignant, timely, and just cruel enough to work. His cinematography has improved in the two years since the earlier film and the editing is better as well. This is still a little rough around the edges to be sure, but a picture like Female Trouble doesn't need the gloss or the sheen of a Hollywood production to work, rather it succeeds on its own ballsy creativity and penchant for outrageousness.

Performances are just as good if not slightly more polished than they were in Pink Flamingos. Divine is absolutely perfect here, she's a serious powerhouse in the last half of the film, strutting her stuff for the camera and the crowd gathered to see her night club act before it all hits the fan for her. She's eminently watchable and really throws herself in to the role with everything that she's got. Amazingly enough, Mink Stole is every bit as good as her daughter. Lochary and Pearce are perfectly devious in their roles, complementing Divine's lead perfectly and Edith Massey is…. well… Edith Massey is Edith Massey and that's all you can really expect from her.

Waters would soften his touch and refine his filmmaking skills in the years to come, but early pictures like this one, Pink Flamingos, Multiple Maniacs haven't lost any of their edge or their freakshow appeal. Crime is beauty!

Video:

Pink Flamingos makes its Blu-ray debut from The Criterion Collection on a 50GB disc in a 1.67.1 widescreen transfer that's taken from a new restored 4k scan of the original 16mm negative supervised by the director. This is a substantial improvement over the previous DVD release not just in terms of detail and clarity but also in terms of color reproduction and black levels. The 16mm photography retains its gritty, grainy look but in terms of print damage there's very little here, just occasional small, white specks. Skin tones look fine and the image is impressively film-like throughout. There are no noticeable issues with compression artifacts nor are there any signs of digital manipulation like noise reduction or edge enhancement. Again, this looks like the low budget, pseudo-underground movie that it is, but Criterion has done an excellent job bringing it to Blu-ray ever so faithfully.