I have to buck the trend here...it seems the world is full of Hairpray fans...but I am not one of them. I loved the 1988 version because it was camp and over the top, and deliciously subversive...but the latest offering is a diluted, lifeless affair that tries to hard to be the next Grease; has songs with little or no singalong quality; is vaguely offensive in its handling of serious issues, and basically offers the audience nothing new. I can remember when Grease came out how everyone rushed out to have the soundtrack - you were something of a social outcast at school if you did not own the album. Will the same sort of buzz be generated by the latest soundtrack to Hairspray? I very much doubt it. The songs are noisy, cluttered, unoriginal and ...stale. I wanted so much to like this film...I really did...but left the cinema thinking I had wasted my time and money. Divine was loud and brash, camp and offensive - Travolta's performance is too coy and restrained to make his character as appealing or memorable. I kept watching to see if he and Chris walken would kiss, but, like the rest of this diluted movie, it appears nobody had to the balls to eat up their roles with relish or conviction ... there is loads of scope to go completely over the top, yet every character comes across as being too scared to be larger than life...as if they tried to make the most inoffensive movie they could..and succeeded. I much preferred the brashy, trashy '88 version.
