CAMPOut: Fay's Rehoboth Journal

Have you seen the film Connie and Carla? Probably not. The critics savaged it so badly that its writer/star Nia Vardalos probably thinks of it as her big fat Greek tragedy.

Well I’m here to tell you to rent it immediately. It’s too late to catch it on the big screen since it disappeared faster than a Madonna movie at Cannes. But the drubbing it got from the critics was not only unfair, it was endemic of the diarrhea of the mouth that critics seem to get when faced with a movie that might appeal to people over a certain age—like anybody who has already been through orthodontia.

If I sound mad, I am. Connie and Carla is that rare movie that serves its hilarity with a side of pride. While it’s spectacularly silly, it also has a sweet little message attached.

So what happens? The critics, in an effort to show off their incredible knowledge of the whole cross-dressing genre, pick the living daylights out of it as they make unfavorable comparisons to every gender bent costume movie in history.

"as in Some Like it Hot blah, blah, blah…"
"Not as clever as Victor/Victoria blah, blah, blah…"
"A cross between Priscilla Queen of the Desert and Tootsie, blah, blah, blah…"

The dolts completely missed the point. Connie and Carla is not a knock-off of any of those films. It’s a love letter to them. And a charming one at that.

I’m not giving anything away by telling you that this movie is a laugh-out-loud story of two female musical comedy wanna-bees, on the run from gangsters, who hide out as Los Angeles drag queens.

Toni Collette partners with Vardalos and she really does look like the quintessential drag queen. Plus, there’s a magnificent performance by Stephen Spinella (the original Broadway star of Angels in America) as a man cautiously trying to reconnect with his straight sibling (played to perfection by an adorable David Duchovny).

As they say in the film, these belles of the balls are a hoot. If the critics had stopped showing off for a minute they would have noticed that the script made you think about weight issues, the Botox craze, discrimination and self respect, even as the gals warbled hilarious (and hilariously costumed) snippets from Oklahoma, Yentl, and, forgive them, Jesus Christ Superstar.

Watching two straight chicks get a taste of anti-gay discrimination is illuminating for the audience, just as it is for the film’s characters. And you get a real good look at a straight man fighting to understand the world experienced by some people who have learned, finally, to like themselves.

I will NOT tell you the name of the musical comedy icon who has a wonderful cameo in the film, but you will howl.

Critics be damned, rent the movie and have a good laugh.

The same can be said for the Ashley Judd-Kevin Kline film De-Lovely. I de-loved it. Although I have to admit that in this case the critics, well, had a case.

They took the film to task for its clunky "is this a hallucination or is there really a Broadway producer talking to an aging Cole Porter about his life story" structure. Yeah, it was pretty stupid, but the fact remains that once they got on with it we had two hours of stunning 1930s and 40s fashions adorning Judd and Kline as they sang Porter’s magnificent, sophisticated songs.

As if that wasn’t plenty, the love story was real, and the film’s depiction of it rang very true. Linda and Cole Porter were devoted to each other, despite the fact that throughout their marriage he had same-sex relationships on the side, and, according to rumors, she might have done the same.

In the film, they pulled no punches and presented the complicated relationship with taste and tenderness.

Again, it was a tidy little grown-up movie whisked out of theatres by a gust of film criticism that didn’t give audiences the chance to discover this gem for themselves.

At this point, give me a flawed (although not seriously) Connie and Carla or a slightly weird (okay, it was odd to hear Cole Porter singing songs in the 1930s segment that he hadn’t written yet. I admit it.) De-Lovely instead of a gory, special effect clogged mega-budget adventure flick any day.

Oh well, the Rehoboth Beach Independent Film Festival is coming up shortly, with no end of grown-up movies to see. I can’t wait for November 10!