Hey Folks, Harry here with another report from Buzz Cardigan from the Sarasota Film Festival - and this time it seems to focus on a film all about them crazy ladies of Wrestling, whom I can't name a one of. For those of you who can, this film's for you...
Howdy-ho. Red-Blooded Red-State Superspy Buzz Cardigan here, from Sunny St. Petersburg FL. You've published a couple of my reviews in the past, though alas NOT my awesome Valentine's Ode to Charles Bronson. In any case, I'm an hour south of Sarasota, where the hoity-toity Sarasota Film Festival runs every year. Wanted to put a bug in your ear about a documentary I saw last night concerning the first female pro wrestlers. Ungracefully lengthy full title: "Lipstick and Dynamite, Piss and Vinegar: the First Ladies of Wrestling."
This is a lot of fun, mostly because of the fascinating lives and personalities of the women involved. Many are in their eighties, but they're still tough broads, and they give great interview. They've come a long way, baby, from female rassling's humble carny beginnings to today's debauched bra 'n' panty WWE spectacles, and have survived enough that they don't feel obligated to pull any punches. There's plenty of dish on their old rivalries, managers and promoters (as sleazy as you might imagine), relationships with midgets, and post-lucha careers as yodelers, nurses, and alligator wrestlers.
Although there's some sketchy camera work-- WHY all the extreme close-ups?-- the documentary does well letting the interview subjects speak for themselves and tell their own stories, with the only interference an occasionally obnoxious singer-songwriter soundtrack. Lots of brutal archival footage, no "big messages," no polemical nothin', just formerly lost history on greats like the Fabulous Moolah, Kill'em Gillem, and others. If you like pro wrestling and/or have enjoyed other histories and behind-the-scenes documentaries, or (like me) have the kind of juvenile mindset that gets a bang out of elderly women cussing, this is worth your 75 minutes. Beers are drunk, wives are cheeted on, and hair is abundantly pulled. On this same subject, I must also recommend Jaime Hernandez' incomprable 3-issue woman-wrestler miniseries, "Whoa Nellie!"
Get well soon, Harry. They can rebuild you. They have the technology.
Fannishly,
Buzz Cardigan
