Star Rating:

I Am Divine

Director: Jeffrey Schwarz.

Actors: Divine, Mark Payne, Michael Musto

Release Date: Saturday 30th November 2013

Genre(s): Documentary

Running time: 90 minutes

I Am Divine serves as both a celebration of one of cinema's oddest characters and also an introduction to the curious, but the VH1 Behind The Music style ruins all the good work.

In taking the audience through the life and times of one Harris Glenn Milstead AKA Divine AKA the Queen of Poor Taste, director Jeffrey Schwarz unearths some rare photos of the actor as an insecure teenager bullied for his weight and general oddness in Baltimore in the late fifties. Schwarz even manages to a persuade a high school sweetheart to recall their time together and how she didn’t think anything was that strange when Glenn would arrange Drag parties.

From there, it's on to the wonderful rare footage of The Dreamlanders, where he meets a young John Waters, the future King of Filth, and it's a meeting of minds. Behind the scenes footage of early films (Mondo Trasho, The Diane Linklater Story) are up next, and then onto the late night stand-up routines, before finally finishing up with the release of Hairspray, frustratingly opening to rave reviews as Divine succumbs to what many feel was an inevitable heart attack.

Rich in information it might be, But I Am Divine is unfortunately another hagiographic career overview disguised as a documentary. Everyone sitting in front of the camera can't wait to lash heaps of praise; the worst thing said about Divine is that she carried too much weight to endure her punishing tour schedule. It also hints at Divine's reluctance at being pushed into the background to accommodate Rikki Lake for Hairspray, but it moves on quickly lest anything untoward be noticed.

The TV style irritates. The soundtrack might keep things bubbly but the sudden changes of tone to match a period in Divine’s life that may not be so lofty is so cheap – we're not a million miles away from the Dun-Dun-Duuuunnn! sound effect. When Divine buys a pool and goes for a splash, there's a sound of a splash on the soundtrack. Tacky, and not in good way.

But as an introduction to Divine, and an exploration on her influence on pop culture, Schwarz ticks enough boxes to garner it worthwhile.