When prissy, prickly Sylvia Stickles (Tracey Ullman) suffers a head injury during a traffic altercation, she's, er, revived by self-appointed sexual missionary Ray-Ray Perkins (Johnny Knoxville) and is transformed into an insatiable, take-no-prisoners sex maniac. Yes, it's a John Waters film. Yes, it's filthy. No, it's not as hilarious and sustained as you'd like it to be. It works for a while, though: Ullman, never a stingy comedienne, does everything Waters dares her to do without hesitation; words cannot describe the perversely sporting delight with which she mounts a water bottle during a round of "The Hokey Pokey" at an old folks' home. And there's some fun to be had when Sylvia's emancipation leads her Baltimore 'burb to new heights of ecstasy, freeing her large-breasted daughter Caprice (Selma Blair) while horrifying husband Vaughn (Chris Isaak) and her hardline mother Big Ethel (Suzanne Shepherd, hysterical) in the process. It's also packed with the standard cameos, the most satisfying of which is good old Patty Hearst at a Sex Addicts Anonymous encounter. But, for all the nasty, necessary glee, the movie feels inescapably been-there-done-that, and you can't help but wish this was 1972 and Divine was on hand to prowl for dog droppings. The most shocking thing about A Dirty Shame is how desperate and tiresome its anarchy becomes.--Steve Wiecking
(7 votes)
2.
Threatening The Very Limits Of Common Decency. It's a scandalous comedy from the dirty mind of John Waters! After an accidental concussion awakens the carnal urges of convenience store owner Sylvia Stickles (Tracey Ullman), the people of Baltimore become pitted against each other in an epic battle of decency vs. depravity. Sylvia meets Ray-Ray Perkins (Johnny Knoxville), a tow-truck driver and secret sexual healer, and together they lead her devoted husband , Vaughn (Chris Isaak), and her go-go dancing daughter, Caprice (Selma Blair), down a whole new road to sexual satisfaction.
(5 votes)
3.
From the wondrously fertile mind of writer/director John Waters comes A DIRTY SHAME, America's first carnal concussion comedy. Set in the Harford Road area of Waters' native Baltimore, A DIRTY SHAME tells what happens when a horny horde of "sex addicts" invade a blue-collar neighborhood, to the shock and dismay of the "neuter" neighbors. Rude, joyous and full of sexual anarchy, A DIRTY SHAME is a movie with a generous heart and a dirty mind: in other words, a classic John Waters comedy.
Lust is in the air on Harford Road and Sylvia Stickles (Tracey Ullman), a grumpy, repressed middle-aged Baltimorean, doesn't like it. Though Sylvia's handsome husband Vaughn (Chris Isaak) still has marital urges, Sylvia couldn't be less interested - she has work to do. Isn't it enough that she has to run the family's "Pinewood Park And Pay" convenience store, and prepare proper meals for their exhibitionist daughter Caprice (Selma Blair), a go-go dancer known to her adoring fans as Ursula Udders? After several "nude and disorderly" violations, Caprice and her stupendously enlarged breasts have been sentenced to home detention in the mother-in-law apartment above the Stickles' garage and now, even the neighbors know.
Everything changes when Sylvia is involved in a freak accident on the way to work and receives her first head injury. Sexy tow-truck driver Ray-Ray Perkins (Johnny Knoxville) rushes to her aid and Sylvia realizes he's no ordinary service man; no, he's a sexual healer who knows how to bring out her flaming cauldron of hidden concussion lust.
A prude no longer, Sylvia suddenly views the world through hypersexual eyes. Vaughn is happily surprised by his wife's resurgent libido, but when he sees her do a raunchy "hootchie-cootchie" dance during a routine visit to a nursing home, he knows something is wrong. Sylvia's mother, Big Ethel (Suzanne Shepherd), already up in arms about the libertines in their midst, decides it is time to fight back. Supported by her sex-hating neighbors like Marge the Neuter (Mink Stole), Big Ethel leads the battle for "Neuter normality."
Burnin' and bewildered, Sylvia seeks out Ray-Ray at his garage, and discovers that she is not alone in erotomania. Head injuries have brought forth a flock of Sex Addicts who have infiltrated every corner of the community, from the post office and the police department to the Stickles' "Park And Pay." Ray-Ray's disciples include some of the most bizarre sexual fetishists known to man, and together the wanton followers plan to take over Harford Road. As the twelfth member of Ray-Ray's inner circle, Sylvia's arrival portends a new age of erotic bliss.
What one concussion giveth, however, another can take away. Sylvia's torrid night out at the Holiday House biker bar is brought to an abrupt close by a second head injury, and her raging libido is snuffed out like a candle. The Stickles family turns to the family doctor and twelve-step meetings to help Sylvia deal with her "runaway vagina" and reclaim her sexual sobriety. But Ray-Ray and his followers have seen the Promised Land, and they will not abandon their sister to erotic anorexia. With a joyous cry of "Let's go sexin'!," Ray-Ray and his followers set out to rescue Sylvia, liberate the community and discover a brand new sex act.
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