Girls Will Be Girls

Very funny. Completely captivating. The visual style was all 70's pastel kitsch: house, clothes, hair. Cheesy low-tech special effects don't seem to follow any particular style but simply add fun comedy touches. Strong language is often fresh and honest. The aging actress character always says exactly what's on her mind. Think of it as "Hairspray" meets "Valley of the Dolls".

Like the love child of "Absolutely Fabulous" and every novel Jacqueline Susann's ever written, "Girls Will Be Girls" is an 80-minute festival of campy trash, hilarious one-liners, and bitchy, catty women. The only catch this time is that the women are all played by men.

Evie (Jack Plotnick) is a washed-up B-movie actress who is decidedly not aging gracefully. She lives with Coco (Clinton Leupp), her more grounded friend who functions mainly as Evie's maid and abuse magnet. Into their lives walks their new roommate Varla (Jeffery Roberson), an aspiring starlet whose late mother Marla (also Roberson in flashbacks) was also Evie's most hated acting rival. All of them have dreams, of course. Evie's dreams involve drinking as many martinis as she can and then having plenty of sex with anyone available. Coco still pines for the hunky abortion doctor that operated on her many years ago. Varla hopes to become the actress that her mother couldn't while dealing with the advances of Evie's gorgeous but microscopically-endowed son Stevie (Ron Mathews). Of course, there are hidden motives galore, and more than one mean-spirited one-liner.

The gimmick of this film, that all the women are played by men, is never as overstated as you may think. After all, the characters are all female, and they are treated in the story as if they are female. It's only slightly different than young boys performing the female roles in Shakespeare's plays. The camp value of the movie focuses not on the drag spectacle, but on the unrelenting melodrama and silliness of the plot, taking the elements of ridiculous films like "Valley Of The Dolls" and upping them to a level so ludicrous, they can only be considered comedy. That the framework of the film makes all of these developments seem perfectly natural and realistic is a credit to director and writer Richard Day.

The actors are all quite game and in on the absurdity of their surroundings. Plotnick is quite humorous, dropping the most mean-spirited one-liners you'll ever laugh at, and the clips of Evie performing in the 60's stinker "Asteroid" resemble nothing less than Morgan Fairchild on quaaludes. Leupp reprises the role of Coco from his scene-stealing moments in the movie "Trick", and he imbues the character both with a humorous sense of bad luck and an immediately sympathetic personality. Roberson is not quite as spectacular as his co-stars, but he gives the naive, trusting Varla a great heart and a hilarious scene involving opera and cheese in a can. Even Mathews is great, all melodramatic soap hunk and hair product.

While the movie receives high marks for style, including efficient and effective set design and a very nice score, it's a very loud movie in the sense that every scene is turned up to 11. While this works most of the time, even at the film's short running time, it tends to strain. The ending veers sharply away from comedy into deep melodramatic territory, and even though it is diffused quite handily, the film almost drowns in TV-movie-of-the-week sap before the mood lightens again. Also, some may find the hostile attitudes of some of the characters, mainly Evie and to a degree Coco, to be too off-putting for comfort. Evie, especially, is one of the most unsympathetic characters you'll meet in a film this year.

Regardless, the film is hilarious and immensely entertaining. A high recommendation for anyone who likes divas, camp, or catty fun. And don't forget to bring the cheese. 8 out of 10.

I have to say, the bad reviews here written by (I'm guessing) bewildered, clueless straight people are almost as funny as the movie. You're either someone who is going to "get" this kind of thing, or you're not. Unfortunately, there's no Rating to warn these kind of people off movies like this.

The movie isn't perfect, but you wouldn't want it to be.

The dialog is very funny, and each of the girls acts up a storm. They're all good in their way, but Varla Jean is outstanding, easily the funniest and most distinctive drag character since Divine.

When it's funny, it's very funny. When it's in bad taste, it's . . . very funny. The sets and costumes (as you would expect) are all letter perfect and there are as many sight gags as there are funny lines. Need cheering up? Rent Girls Will Be Girls . . . .

A comedy/drama with guys in drag playing the three female leads. Over the hill actress Evie Harris (Jack Plotnick) and her maid Coco (Clinton Leupp) bring in a housemate--young energetic Varla (Jeffrey Roberson). However it turns out Varla is the daughter of Evie's long-decreased rival. Coco tries to keep everything under control but it doesn't work.

The film is very funny--full of vicious bitchy humor which mostly works. Plotnick spits out toxic lines with ease, Leupp plays straight man most of the time and Roberson is full of life and energy. It moves quickly (it's only 80 minutes) has some incredible costumes and production design (Evie's house alone is a jaw-dropper) and has some nice eye candy from hunky Ron Mathews (playing Stevie--Evie's son). However some of the jokes fall flat (or are TOO vicious) and it takes an unwise turn to all out drama towards the end...but the VERY end is a happy one. A one of a kind and not really great but is worth catching.

What a treat. I'm so glad I knew nothing about this film. I heard no buzz, had no opinions. Don't even know why we watched it. But the night we did, I don't think I've laughed that hard since I was on a teen field trip to see Romeo and Juliet (1968 version) with my class. After the movie, they screened Life of Brian, and for some odd reason, our teachers allowed us to stay. The Bigus Dickus scene had me gasping for air.... and I can assure you, my reaction was more than a snicker.

Back to this film. In the proud tradition of camp, drag, too much makeup, and false eyes, John Waters I'm sure had a proud grin whenever he saw this one. I'm intentionally saying very little about the film, because, its really not worth getting into. This film is more of an experience. See it with friends, straight or gay (mix is best). I'm sure we'll be popping this one in the DVD player, probably as a warm up or cool down for future Rocky Horror night.

One last note: Idea for an extra on a future DVD release of the film... Have each of the ladies read, the bad reviews from the IMDB. I enjoyed those almost as much as the film.

Now pardon me, I'm going to pop my last remaining copy of Asteroid into the VCR...

Later darlings.