“Pearl” Is the Maniacal Somewhere Over the Rainbow-Yearning (Anti-)Heroine We’ve Been Waiting For
Camp / Film

“Pearl” Is the Maniacal Somewhere Over the Rainbow-Yearning (Anti-)Heroine We’ve Been Waiting For

“I’M A STAR!” Mia Goth’s psychotic stardom-reaching farmer’s daughter Pearl bends at the waist in her scarlet red version of Margaret Hamilton’s nefarious cyclist Almira Gulch’s high-collared dress in The Wizard of Oz and howls that line from the depths of her soul. Pearl has just attempted a rousing half-imagined bomb-strewn trenches boogie, a kind … Continue reading

Sex by a Thousand Cuts: David Cronenberg’s “Crimes of the Future”
Film

Sex by a Thousand Cuts: David Cronenberg’s “Crimes of the Future”

David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future presents us with a decaying modern civilization seamlessly coinciding with the moldy wear and tear of contemporary Athens — a fitting shooting location for a sci-fi dystopia that forgoes the polished surfaces, spacefaring, and multiverse traversal that other sci-fi dystopias depict. This version of the future offers up a … Continue reading

Welcome Back to the Pleasure Dome: “After Blue (Paradis sale)” Resurrects the Filthy Delights of Camp Artifice
Camp / Decadence / Film

Welcome Back to the Pleasure Dome: “After Blue (Paradis sale)” Resurrects the Filthy Delights of Camp Artifice

Are you sick to death of sleek cinema? An overbearing aesthetic that has trickled down so far that even the most whacko experimental films and unhinged underground movies strive to achieve a similar spotless surface perfection as those boring big-budget Hollywood films? Blech! Give me the awkward, the uncanny, the janky, the shonky, the half-baked, … Continue reading

All My Love Forever: Warhol’s Love Stories That Art History Never Knew It Needed in “The Andy Warhol Diaries”
Art / Film

All My Love Forever: Warhol’s Love Stories That Art History Never Knew It Needed in “The Andy Warhol Diaries”

What if the artist who spent most of his career seeking to “be a machine” never really nailed it? That’s the central question of the aggravatingly flawed but incredibly moving Netflix docuseries The Andy Warhol Diaries, directed by Andrew Rossi. This expansive six-part series uses Warhol’s posthumously published diaries—or really his compulsive daily telephone ramblings … Continue reading

It’s More Like Beanie Baby Bankruptcy: A Conversation on “Beanie Mania”
America Is Doomed / Film / Scams / Trash

It’s More Like Beanie Baby Bankruptcy: A Conversation on “Beanie Mania”

America is a series of scams. That’s the only conclusion to come to after watching HBO Max’s documentary Beanie Mania, directed by Yemisi Brookes, which explores the brand of capitalism unique to the United States as filtered through the Beanie Baby frenzy of the late 1990s: get rich quick schemes, exploitation of workers, tax evasion, … Continue reading

6 Videos To Watch While Waiting For The Second Coming of JFK Jr. This Thanksgiving
Camp / Film

6 Videos To Watch While Waiting For The Second Coming of JFK Jr. This Thanksgiving

Why hello there, dearest Filthy Dreams gobblers! What’s that? You’re excited for the second annual pandemic Thanksgiving?! Well, who isn’t, my little stuffed turklets! When Filthy Dreams was originally conceived as a camp twist on the idea of Nietzsche’s eternal return—a show happening on the hour every hour—a decade ago, we never quite realized how … Continue reading

Diana-rama!: Why Does Princess Di Inspire Such Schlock (And Why Do I Love It So)?
Camp / Film / Trash

Diana-rama!: Why Does Princess Di Inspire Such Schlock (And Why Do I Love It So)?

In the latter half of the year of our Lord—or really Lady—2021, I decided to become a Princess Diana obsessive. That’s right, send me all your purple Princess Diana Beanie Babies that you’ve been squirreling away under your beds since the late 1990s just in case they finally become worth more than NFTs. I’m now … Continue reading

Peace Sells…but Who’s Buying?: A Conversation on “Woodstock 99: Peace, Love & Rage”
America Is Doomed / Film / Music / Trash

Peace Sells…but Who’s Buying?: A Conversation on “Woodstock 99: Peace, Love & Rage”

HBO’s documentary Woodstock 99: Peace, Love, and Rage, directed by Garret Price as a part of their Music Box series, seems to pose Woodstock ’99 as a seminal concert shitshow, like 1969’s Altamont, that somehow, in its dissolution into hormone-driven madness, which included chucking $4 water bottles at Wyclef Jean and The Offspring, rolling around … Continue reading