14.02.24, 20:30, Female Trouble (1974)

Fuck Valentine's Day. Damn all the kitschy heart decorations that take over the capitalist relay stick of Father Christmas. Away with expensive dating plans where the tablecloth can barely support the weight of your existential insecurities. Boo to the promises of kiddies and labradors in houses that have been unaffordable for over 20 years. This Valentine's Day, grab your bouquet of roses by the thorns and treat yourself to a Weird Wednesday that makes romantic conventions go blue. Invite your arch-enemy, vindictive ex-lover, or judgmental grandparent to Female Trouble. For this queer cult classic gagging-on-lipstick in neon stockings by John Waters sours any chance of reconciliation.

After the provocative parades of Multiple Maniacs (1970) and Pink Flamingos (1972), the pope of bad taste unpacks with a murderous melodrama celebrating depravity. Disgruntled that her parents bought the wrong shoes for Christmas Day ("nice girls don't wear cha-cha heels"), decadent teenager Dawn Davenport embraces a life of crime. Growing increasingly enamoured with brutal rejection of the norm, she finds herself in a series of absurd situations and escalating problems. Divine, goddess of the grotesque, shines here like an indomitable force of nature to hollow stereotypes and wrong winks. The technicolour terror of the films mise-en-scène further rams the paradoxes of good middle-class existence through your eye sockets. We love you too.