Movie: Hairspray (2007, full runtime 117 minutes)Running length: 15 minutes, 3-minute cool down, followed by around 2 minutes of stretching
Review: OK, the general consensus of the gym seemed to be that this was the wrong movie to show at the Cardio Cinema. In the 20 minutes I was there, roughly 15 people walked in the room, stared at the screen for a second, then immediately walked out. Seems that no one wanted to see campy songs and John Travolta prancing around in a fat suit. Go figure.
Plot: Well, I'm cheating, because I've actually seen the entire John Waters version a couple of times, so I'm aware of the basic plot. I don't remember this much singing in the movie though. Ohhhh, wait this is a movie based on the musical version. That makes sense. I don't know, it's cute I guess. The trend of making cult classics into musicals is a weird one though. I hope they don't try to do it with Eraserhead or Down By Law.
Good: There's not much to complain about. The musical numbers (and they happened once every six seconds) were amiable and I gathered people who liked the musical would find them fun. Plus, everyone can get behind the "civil rights" and "nothing wrong with being overweight" messages of the movie and if you've seen any other John Waters movie, you know that his movies having any sort of message at all is a huge step (which is why they probably chose to make a musical and a movie out of this rather than, say, Pink Flamingos).
Bad: There's not much to praise either. I guess I have issue with remakes that don't shift too much from the original film. It's basically like watching the movie again, with younger, cuter people in the roles. I suppose it's a good way to get a quirky movie out to a wider, younger audience, however since there are no new ideas (other than songs), the whole thing just seems kinda average to me.
Grade: C+ I'm being a little hard on a movie I only saw 20 minutes of, so I'm gonna upgrade it with a plus, just in case the rest of the movie was freaking spectacular.
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