The “beyond bad” movie John Waters and Tennessee Williams both call “the best film ever made”
The movies of John Waters definitely aren’t for everyone. The filmmaker, often referred to as the Pope of Trash, revels in all things weird, stomach-turning and outrageous. His most iconic movie, Pink Flamingos, was banned in many parts of the world due to its grossness, perhaps due to the scene where Divine eats real dog shit. Or maybe it was because of the moment when the actor gives a real-life blowjob to the character who is meant to portray her son.
Regardless, Waters’ films have shocked audiences for decades, and he has become an icon of camp cinema. The director once said: “To understand bad taste, one must have very good taste,” which explains his love for both acclaimed pieces of cinema and movies considered downright terrible. Over the years, Waters has praised movies that aren’t typically regarded as high-brow masterpieces, like Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. In fact, one of his favourite movies of all time is Boom! by Joseph Losey, which was an incredibly poorly received financial failure.
Losey’s film, starring big stars like Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, was adapted from Tennessee Williams’ The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore. Since its release, the director has revealed that most of the actors and crew were incredibly drunk throughout filming – and you can certainly tell. The movie contains corny dialogue, plenty of screaming fits, and bizarre characters. But that’s why Waters loves it so much – he even includes a poster of the movie in the background of Pink Flamingos.
In the book The Best Film You’ve Never Seen: 35 Directors Champion the Forgotten or Critically Savaged Movies They Love, Waters waxed lyrical about the movie. He described Boom! as “beyond bad” before adding: “It’s the other side of camp. It’s beautiful, atrocious, and it’s perfect. It’s a perfect movie, really, and I never tire of it.”
However, that’s not all he’s said. Talking to Vice, Waters gave an impassioned speech on the brilliance of Boom!, revealing that Williams “said it was the best film ever made”. Detailing further, he added: “Which to this day only he and I can agree on. He’s right though. The play was called The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore, but that was too long to put on the marquee so they called the film Boom!, which is the sound of a bomb going off—ironic, considering how hard it bombed.”
Waters continued: “It’s so awful it’s perfect. My favorite bit is when Elizabeth Taylor pukes into a handkerchief, looks down and there’s blood, and she says, ‘Ah! A paper rose!’ The script is ridiculous. Come on, it’s about the richest woman in the world, called ‘Sissy Goforth,’ and the Angel of Death.”
Waters called Boom! “a staggering movie”, suggesting that “it’s worth seeing it with a live audience because you just don’t know how to react at the beginning”. The director continued: “You think, What is the tone of this? That’s the thing that is so bizarre. Apparently Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor were drunk for the whole time they were filming it. Elizabeth Taylor kept wanting to buy the set and it had a roof and they had to tell her it wasn’t real. She wanted to live there and they had to say, ‘We’re making a movie! This isn’t a real house!'”
Watch the trailer for Boom! below.
