"The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" (1994)

www.that-movie-site.com

THE ADVENTURES OF PRISCILLA, QUEEN OF THE DESERT

Reviewed by Heather Picker

Written and Directed by Stephan Elliott. Starring Terence Stamp, Hugo Weaving, and Guy Pearce, with Bill Hunter. 1994, 102 min., Rated R (for profanity, sexual situations, and adult situations). Available on video and DVD.

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert features all the quiet heartbreaks and redemptions and emotional disclosures and self-discoveries you'd expect from a film following three characters with strained relationships on the road, and all the laughs you'd expect from a buddy comedy, but with a twist: two of the characters are female impersonators, the third a transsexual. (Not just any transsexual, mind you, a transsexual who was once at the top of her profession in the Les Girls revue.)

Tick, also known as Mitzi (Hugo Weaving), a part-time shill for Wo-Man cosmetics who moonlights as a drag performer, kicks things off with a musical number, lip-synching "I've Never Been to Me" with an appropriately campy gusto that establishes Priscilla's tone. When he's offered the opportunity to perform at a casino in Alice Springs he calls upon friends and fellow entertainers Adam/Felicia (Guy Pearce) and Bernadette (Terence Stamp) to join him. Their emotional baggage, including Tick's secret past, Adam's troubled childhood, and Bernadette's struggle with a mid-life crisis, is the fourth passenger on their bus, christened Priscilla, as they leave from Sydney, Australia.

On the road they encounter bigotry, breakdowns, and glimpses of resolutions to their own problems. (In Bernadette's case this comes in the form of Bill Hunter's Bob, a noble mechanic who joins the group for the last leg of their journey after being disgraced by his wife.) None of it is trivialized by filmmaker Stephan Elliott, who directs with a sort of respectful jovialness shared by the actors. Stamp has the toughest role, one a lesser actor could discredit with little effort, but he is dignified and at times supremely sad as Bernadette; it's a truly moving performance that lends credibility to the film, an enjoyable comedy with a few small problems. The one-dimensional, stereotypical bigots are overused and Elliott glosses over opportunities to delve beneath the protagonists' gaudy exteriors and give them real character. Otherwise, The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is a little desert, sweetened by a retro-infused soundtrack of disco favorites and kitschy fluff, and by show-stopping musical numbers pulled off by the confident, charismatic, and outrageously outfitted trio of actors.

Home | Reviews | About | Capsule Reviews | Links