John waters is an American filmaker who made crude, truly bad taste experiments like Pink Flamingos and Desperate Living. All of Waters' early movies show disturbing sequences and he expected people to watch them only to be "shocked". In fact, his first three movies (Pink Flamingos, Desperate Living and Female Trouble) are known as Trash Trilogy and depends solely on shock value. How many of us can stand Babs Johnson played by Divine (a drag queen / waters regular) eating dog feces in the climax of his path-breaking work Pink Flamingos which was shot in a 16 mm film? The movie DVD was re-released in the US with NC-17 rating (when it was first released, it was given X rating like most of his films) and went on to become a hit among the movie goers, and a cult movie. It also made Divine, an obese crossdresser (not to be mistaken as a transvestic) an underground superstar. The métier of his films are the curio feel it generates in the viewers. It would be interesting to know how did he manage to get such vibrant and niche fan following for his off-beat flicks. His early works created deep interest to some film goers while caused nausea to some. He popularised the term edgy humor and non sequitur* through his works which mainly dealt with horrid lifestyles in American small town, Baltimore(Waters' hometown. Also, Divine's). He introduced a gimmick called "Odorama" with his movie Polyester (1981) whereby viewers could smell what they saw on screen through a scrach and sniff card. Later on, he went on to make movies like HairSpray, Crybaby and Serial Mom which were resultantly proved his inventiveness in the mainstream sphere too. His recent creative was A Dirty Shame (2004), where again he went back to the Baltimore underground lifestyle with pervasive strong crude sexual content, including fetishes.
India would be just the wrong place for a film maker as blatant, mawkish and kitsch as John Waters. S/he will be drummed out to anyone of the three seas (of her/his choice) sorrounding the vast subcontinent by the advocates of moral absolutism (socially dominant) . Before that, they would chop off her/his artistic sense singling out "the bad taste". Those who appreciate "the bad taste" will be ostrasized. Moral absolutism is so rampant and has so much percieved validity here that people think everything should be scaled in "absolute" terms, at least films. Deepa Mehta's Fire(1996) for instance, was a movie that was highly controversial for limning lesbianism. As they (the moral stalwarts) dissented and argued that it's vulgar and it's against the social norms, they failed to prove such practices are any less in India. They were circuitously arguing that certain realities are better off not exploited by film makers. If they do, they would make it look like film makers are harassing the country's culture! The film was banned after Hindu fundamentalists (sensitive creatures!) attacked cinemas screened it, quite brutally (quite paradoxical!). But some of us in India, did manage to watch the film through VHS/VCDs (uncut versions) or on TV (censored).
Despite the fact that India is a conservative society and the popular percept that camp/kitsch/underground movies are much receptive in advanced societies, India remains one of the world's largest producers of camp+ art! (in terms of volumes, at least) This should shock many. India's Bollywood, Tamil, Telugu and other numerous regional films are comfortably fit to the crudest definition of camp. They are true intentional camp that can leave you brainsick and baffled if you truly understand the aesthetic value of cinema. Bollywood, (some people were mistaken it as an offshoot of Hollywood in the East!) makes 100s of bad cinema every year with a very few exceptions. And most of the bang-on super hits belong to the former catagory and the exceptions are mostly least grossers. A stark contrast to Hollywood movies. In Hollywood, such movies are either classified as B-grade or Underground films. However, there's a seemingly corollary to some Bollywood blockbusters in Hollywood. Kuch Kuch Hota Hai(1998), an Indian mainstream film directed by Karan Johar and My Best Friend's Wedding(1997), a chickflick were huge grossers despite being low in artistic value. But I would argufy here, that the differences stated previously do underact similarities quite successfully.
So doesn't this mean Indian viewers do have a sense of aesthetics when it comes to films made in poor taste? The answer would range from a groping yes to a firm no while the thrust remains on the upper limit. Films being an art form are ferociously subjective. When they make films, Indian directors do know that their films exemplify "poor taste", most of the times. They do so because they know an average Indian film goer does have "poor taste" when it comes movies, music or general entertainment(Example: Kajara re by Alisha Chinoy, the smash hit soundtrack from the 2005 flick Bunty aur Babli). It wouldn't be hard to reason out that why he would appreciate such works more than pure art. For the benefit of those who might argue this is commercial cinema, I would like cite the case of Hollywood "commercial" movies with some high artistic value. And Indian films scores less in this spectrum despite having no lack of good talent. The point in focus is the compromise of artistic formulation for the sake of viewers with some poor taste! In terse, Commercial cinema in India is compelled to be low in content quality to be commercially viable in most cases!
Floccinaucinihilipilification** is an art in India (though it's not specifically called so here). An artist seeking creative freedom may probably feel the most intimidated and crucified in the Indian perspective. The only reason why it happens is because our social fabric is one of the most delicate ones in the world. It's like a gimmick that you would have seen a magician trying to perform with a pack of cards. The lasting period of such a gimmick is consummately dependent on the skills of that magician who we also call our constitutional system.
** Floccinaucinihilipilification is the act or habit of esteeming or describing something as worthless, or making something to be worthless by said means.
* A non sequitur is a literary device; in comedy (as opposed to in formal logic) it is a comment which, due to its lack of meaning relative to the comment it follows, is absurd to the point of being humorous. Its use can be deliberate or unintentional.
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