Satirist Nabs Movie Queen!

By RICHARD CORLISS

In the land of no taste, the man with bad taste is king. John Waters has been lobbing turd grenades at American culture since Pink Flamingos in 1972. These days, with unimaginative grossness prevailing in popular art, Waters seems a throwback, an Edwardian dandy forced to baby-sit the South Park kids. How to offend, he must wonder, without being an old fart?

Here's one way: make a comedy about a radical group that kidnaps a rich young woman and brainwashes her into joining their cause. And, in a piquant move, cast the real Patty Hearst in a small role. But since this is a movie about movies--spoiled film fatale Honey Whitlock (Melanie Griffith) is taken hostage by a cinematic liberation army led by a dreamy buff who calls himself Cecil B. DeMented (Stephen Dorff)--an air of fantasy permeates the entire jape, detoxifying it. There's a geniality to gags about ratings ("Hey, hey, M.P.A.A., how many movies did you censor today?") and Robin Williams weepies ("Patch Adams does not deserve a director's cut; the original was long enough"). Waters wants everyone to have a good laugh, targets and audience included.

The two stars give their roles a dizzy spin. Dorff's Cecil sports a manic gleam that could be dementia or star quality (if there's a difference), and Griffith is aces as the Hollywood harridan; when she sees her super-stretch limo, in white, she snarls, "Do I look like a coke dealer?" Maybe Waters is ironizing his anger at the movie brats who have stolen his attitude but don't understand his spirit. If so, the master is giving the kids a lesson here. Cecil B. proves how a dose of smart bad taste can be jolly good fun.

--R.C.