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List Price: $19.98 | | Label: Live / Artisan
Salesrank: 96664
Released: January 23, 2001 |
| Our Price: $6.95 |
| Used Price: $2.90 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
John Waters spoofs independent filmmaking at its most absurd fringe with this affectionate portrait of a guerrilla filmmaking collective that declares war on Hollywood drivel. Bitchy screen queen Honey Whitlock (Melanie Griffith, whose kewpie doll voice and aging baby face are right at home) is kidnapped by would-be auteur Cecil (Stephen Dorff), a slogan-spouting bottle blonde with a cult-like crew of cinema outlaws called "The Sprocket Holes." Cecil has declared war on Hollywood with the ultimate underground movie, "Raving Beauty," and his reluctant star Honey soon adopts her young misfit captors like a worried Mommy as her cultural cachet rises: the falling star has turned into a cult cinema rebel. It's a bizarre revision of the Patty Hearst story (with Hearst herself in a supporting role) full of film insider jokes and '60s revolutionary references, but it's more spoof than satire. Waters's primitive style is often clumsy, and the picture moves in fits and starts, but the cast's enthusiasm brings it to life. Waters has always celebrated misfits, outcasts, and cultural rebels and their self-made families, and this is his most outrageous, anarchic such bunch in decades. Through all the shootouts, bomb throwing, and fights with angry teamsters and suburban moms, there's an odd sense of innocence to the enterprise. It's as if Waters wants to remind us: it's only a movie. --Sean Axmaker
Cecil B. Demented Reviews:
Demented forever! 
2009-06-08 - John Waters' love letter to underground cinema may very well be the greatest thing he's ever done. For all its bloodsoaked slapstick and faux-revolutionary mischief, Cecil B. Demented still comes off as a sweetly eccentric ode to everything that is great and honest about art, as well as an affectionate tribute to the freaks, weirdos, and outsiders who make life so interesting. Of course, it also features an infectiously chipper Satanist, a vindictive handicapped child, a troubled porn diva, the utter annihilation of a Forrest Gump sequel, filmmaking techniques that involve grenades, Patty Hearst, and an epic battle between obese teamsters and aficionados of gerbil-based pornography. Enjoy!
Brilliant
2009-01-10 - When I first saw this film, it was on t.v. I didn't know what to think, but I saw it again and fell in love. This film whether or not you hate it; makes valid points throughout the film. One of the quotes is "Family is another word for censorship." I love family films but I agree with the statement. Does the MPAA rate movies correctly, sense the late sixties they have been bestowed privileges to rate movies. With all that aside its a brilliant film, some parts are disgusting and may be too crude for younger viewers. For the most part "Cecil B. Demented" is an "A" class film, in this critics mind. I suggest renting the movie first or finding a friend with good taste to watch the movie before purchasing it.
Extra Review 
2008-10-24 - Since I was an extra in this movie, I have to say it was fantastic. I didn't give it 5 stars because Mr. Waters has done better...but it's entertaining, nonetheless.
B. Demented, check it out...
2008-07-07 - John Waters at play in the fields of his beloved Baltimore, once again. This time with a "gang of cinematic misfits" led by Stephen Dorff.
Melanie Griffith gets kidnapped and gets her hair bleached "right off the deep end of the Clairol color chart!". Gratuitous sex, violence and pornographic hijinks ensue.
Extra treat: Patricia Hearst plays the much-loved 'mom' of one of the cinematic "terrorists". B Demented and feel free to check this out.
Garbage still smells like stank the next morning. 
2008-04-04 - I know that if my garbage can is lined with a scented bag, the insides still reak of yuck. Even if I tie it with a knot and place it on the curb, and the knot is finely taught and the bags lined in proportion, deep down somewhere in the recesses of my minds eye, I still know, no matter how hard I may want to candycoat it, that it is still trash.
Here then is Cecil B. Demented. I understand that my foulness of this horrible film will be a flame war for those avant-garde, art house, belly churning, curtled milk type, Grindhouse-praising 'as-if-it's-the-next greatest-thing-to-sliced-bread' groupies, however if you are a die hard john waters fan, what's there not to love?? If he made poop walk, you would think it was fascinating.
Waste money, buy this, and then trash it. It is as appealing as leaving your trash untied and unkept in your living room. Pure and total ca-ca.
