Hairspray: A Strange Little Ray of Hope

by Ann Bauer

There are hundreds of movies that have informed, moved, touched, piqued, or entertained me, but only a handful that have filled me with unmitigated joy: Bringing Up Baby, an off-the-wall 1938 Katharine Hepburn/Cary Grant comedy; Bagdad Cafe, a film from 1988 that got mixed reviews but has one of the most haunting soundtracks I’ve ever heard; and strangely, last year’s biopic about Leonard Cohen, I’m Your Man, which caused me to leave the theater weeping and grateful for reasons I couldn’t even name.

Add to these the current release of Hairspray.

I’ll admit, I haven’t seen the original John Waters version. (I know, I know, this is an egregious omission in my own personal film education.) But I’ve been told that it’s “campy.” Come to think of it, that’s the only adjective I’ve heard applied to it. And the truth is that I’m not a big fan of camp. In my experience, life is odd and dissonant and colorful and wonderfully inconsistent all on its own; you don’t need to heighten these elements in order to make a point.

The 2007 release of Hairspray, still in theaters today, is not particularly campy. It’s remarkably sweet — so sweet, in fact, that I was leery at first. When the film opened with a robust, stiff-haired teenager bounding out of bed and dashing into the streets of Kennedy-era Baltimore to sing, I steeled myself for treacle. Somehow, though, despite scads of bouffy-haired young people crooning ballads, the film managed to avoid this. And halfway through, I realized it had become a tract on everything that is wholesome, righteous, moral, and good, while raising real issues about human dignity and cultural standards of beauty.

I’m not saying Hairspray is realistic — it isn’t. But that’s what’s so great about it. Sit down to watch this movie and you get to enter a world where black and white DO become equal, where the fat girl dances to wild applause, and where family means everything.

Also, there’s Queen Latifah, without a doubt that most fabulous female icon since Mae West, walking with golden hair and a flickering candle, singing in that scorching voice. And the tenderest, most romantic scene of the last decade played out between Christopher Walken and John Travolta — proving, at least to this mostly jaded viewer, that a great movie can open up and show you something new and unexpected. What a joy that is.