Saturday, August 25, 2007

Movie Review

Movie Review – “Hairspray” The Movie

The movie is based on the Tony award-winning Broadway musical, Hairspray (1988) by John Waters who incidentally, cameos as a flasher at the start of the movie. An all-star ensemble cast starring John Travolta as Edna Turnblad, Queen Latifah as Motormouth Maybelle, Michelle Pfeiffer as Velma Von Tussle, Christopher Walken as Wilbur Turnblad, Zac Efron as Link Larkin, Brittany Snow as Amber Van Tussle, Amanda Bynes as Penny Pingleton, James Marsden as Corny Collins, Elijah Kelly as Seaweed and introducing newcomer Nikki Blonsky as Tracy Turnblad.
The tunes are catchy, singing is pitchy, dancing is groovy, wardrobes are flashy and hair is all BIG with plenty of hairspray. The year was 1962 and TV is still black and white as with racial segregation. Tracy Turnblad is a young high school girl who idolizes Link Larkin on Baltimore daytime TV trendiest dance party known as “The Corny Collins Show”. When a ‘regular’ spot opens up in the show, Tracy sets her mind on auditioning for the dream role with an added opportunity to meet the man of her dreams. However, her protective mother Edna is afraid that Tracy might be ridiculed for her plus-size and get emotionally hurt in the process. She is consciences of her own weight problem and lacks confidence to face the public, thereby confining herself in the compound of their home. On the other hand, cheery Dad, Wilbur urges their daughter to go for it and think BIG to be big! Armed with her straight-laced sidekick, Penny Pingleton, Tracy went for the audition with high hopes, only to be chided for being fat and ugly by the Von Tussles. However, this is not the last we see of Tracy Turnblad.
A misunderstanding instigated by Amber Von Tussle landed Tracy in detention but discovers a whole new world of Negro dancing. She immediately forges a new wave of friendship with Seaweed and gang. Dancing has no racial barriers and it was the bridge to understanding each other cultures and moves. Soon, she wins them over with her slick dancing ability and racial openness. Spurred on by seaweed and Link, Tracy wowed the masses at the High School Dance and catches the eye of Corny Collins himself. As they say, the rest is history and Tracy made it onto the show but not without much dismay from WYZT station manager, Velma Von Tussle. Tracy’s sudden popularity is a massive threat to Amber from retaining the title of “Miss Teenage Hairspray” for the fourth year running and being the schemer that she is, nothing is beyond Velma to make sure Amber gets all the votes needed to be crowned once again. The racial divide widens when “Negro Day”, headlined by Motormouth Maybelle and her equally-talented black dancers is canned by the station in favour of Velma’s WHITE direction. Tracy’s insistence to integrate both worlds, Black + White result in a protest march and another half-truth caused her to go into hiding as a fugitive of the law. In between all this madness, Seaweed’s chance meeting with Penny started a chain of events and the two teens eventually fell in love, further thickening the racial tensions. The final gauntlet is thrown and the day of voting for “Miss Teenage Hairspray” has finally arrived. Our heroine will gatecrash the party and make her presence felt. Also checkout Edna’s dance steps as well, she can certainly shake that Ass! Go watch the movie adaptation and get a kick out of the musical melodies, funny script, dance choreography, superb acting and a history lesson. Four stars out of Five!

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