To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar

Calling To Wong Foo campy doesn't do the film justice: The film camps it up but still allows us to believe in the characters. Snipes and Swayze are so successful in exploring their feminine sides that all of their future roles should be played in drag.

Thankfully, To Wong Foo . . . has a heart. It leaves us optimistic. Kidron and neophyte script writer Douglas Carter Beane seem to think that regardless of environment and situation, our differences are key to our survival. They celebrate the fundamental need for acceptance and integration. [08 Sep 1995, p.F5]

Wong Foo is pure fantasy and sets up the cross-dressers as avenging spirits of fun, frolic and frisky style. Like samurai cleans ing a village of its criminal scum, they transform Snydersville from a drab, dusty whistle stop to a wonderland of wigs, sidewalk cafes and spontaneous dance parties.

I feel like recommending the performances, and suggesting they be transported to another film. The actors emerge with glory for attempting something very hard and succeeding remarkably well. They deserve to be in a better movie.

Ultimately, the comedy comes across as a celebration of openness, alternative lifestyles and bonding, all life-affirming values that in the 1990s are beyond reproach — or real controversy.

Unconvincing and annoying, a miscalculation on numerous fronts, it is finally sugary enough to make the sentimental Priscilla play like a model of icy restraint.

It's more interested in enlightening than entertaining, and Kidron seems to go out of her way to sap the life out of every scene. It's a horribly directed movie. [08 Sep 1995, p.5G]