Review of Cry-Baby (1990) by Jonathan F — 20 Nov 2013

A 1950's set musical that stars the slicked back hair, black leather-jacket wearing bad boy, the preppy, good-girl blonde bombshell and their inevitable attraction to one another has famously been done in the 1978 film Grease.

Twelve years later, schlock (and camp) master John Waters got his dirty little fingers to hit record on the camera and produced his interpretation of this sort of story in the 1990 film Cry-Baby. The story is simple, the musical pieces are catchy (and cheesy), and the characters are all memorable (Hatchet-Face, for better or worse, comes to mind) in what all comes together in an experience that is very unique, offbeat and surprisingly satisfying.