#wigbudgets

It’s Oscar week, bebe! I am really trying to see ALL the nominated movies (that involve wigs) before Sunday. I should have probably seen West Side Story in the theater but didn’t because of looming omnicron (and because I’m a garbage person) but it’s finally on HBO Max and Disney Plus. There is absolutely no reason why this movie should have been remade but I will say: this remake is good! But what about the wigs? Let’s discuss. 

I guess if you’re going to remake a movie that won 10 Oscars and really did not need remaking at all - at least do it with a huge budget and make everything really pretty? THIS MOVIE FEELS PRETTY (see what I did there?) The art direction, cinematography, costumes and, yes, wigs clearly got some cash thrown at them. AS IT ALWAYS SHOULD BE!!! The main wigs on display are on Anita and her gals and they are all 50s perfection.  The seamwork, texture, and quality of these wigs are impeccable and I love that the wigs on all the background dancers are just as high quality. TAKE NOTE: GIVE WIGS SOME MONEY, HUNNY!

Ariana DeBose will probably win an Oscar as Anita and I hope her wig does too! Look at this coif!

Maria and Tony were honestly kind of boring and their hair was meh but like whatever - it’s all about Anita anyway!!!!

The dudes just grew their hair out and greased it back - as it should be! Grow those manes for your craft!!

The one exception was the normally bald-headed Corey Stoll. This man wig actually wurqs!!! And has a back taper! That never happens!!! I am shook!

And then there’s Rita. SHE IS 90s YEARS OLD! Let us all be blessed with her longevity and style and wig budget. I think this wig might honestly be one she has for everyday use but YOU DO YOU RITA! YOU HAVE AN EGOT AND HAVE EARNED THE RIGHT!!!

Throw a scarf on this wig and call it a day. All nice old lady wigs should be this good! I’m really rooting for the wig department on this movie to win on Sunday because these wigs wurq down to their roots! (As does this movie!)

VERDICT: WURQS

You guys. The movie event of the holiday season is finally here! We all know that Dolly Parton is the queen of everything but also specifically the queen of Christmas (I even did a presentation on this very subject back when movie theaters existed!!) and Dolly is only upping her Christmas output this year. Not only did she release A Holly Dolly Christmas (her first Christmas album in 30 years!) but also Dolly Parton’s Christmas on The Square which debuted November 22 on Netflix. If you like Christmas movies with just a little bit of Christmas and a lot of choreography, wigs, and of course DOLLY, this movie is for you! Let’s discuss.

First off, Dolly’s Christmas content exists on a whole other plane of reality so any review of it must also accept that this is completely divorced from real life/time/space/seasons/logic. If you found either Mamma Mia! film too grounded or verite, Dolly Christmas content is definitely for you. Also good and bad don’t exist in these movies either: JUST DOLLY.

Much like Dolly’s last (narrative) Christmas movie, Christmas of Many Colors: Circle of Love, I watched this with my 5yo daughter who had as many feelings about this as I did. Thus, we begin our journey on THE SQUARE which is not so much a town (or part of a town?) but a mood created on a film set populated by high kicking people outfitted entirely by J Crew. My daughter compared it to Cinderella 3 (her codename for the 1997 TV version of Cinderella) which similarly begins on a TV set square where too many people are doing choreography in preparation for a seasonal event. Note: also this movie was directed AND choreographed by none other than Debbie Effing Allen. SO.

In THE SQUARE, we are also introduced to Dolly herself, disguised as a homeless woman asking for change and most definitely greenscreened into the choreographed melee. Dolly does exist on an entirely different existential plane from the rest of us garbage people so she can greenscreen into whatever choreographed mess she likes!

We also meet Christine Baranski (praise be!) who plays a businesswoman who once lived in THE SQUARE but now has only returned to it RUIN EVERYTHING! Much like any businesswoman in a TV Christmas movie, she has no time for feelings, small towns, or lunch and has an assistant who feels the brunt of all her meanness. This character also relies on the convenient TV conceit that towns can be owned by one person, and she is that one person! And is gonna sell this town! She is basically The Grinch and Scrooge rolled into one and cares not for Christmas or real estate laws and has set out to evict the whole damn SQUARE (the town and the actual town square) on Christmas Eve!

This somehow also includes these FABULOUSLY COSTUMED holiday dogs in a wagon (which can definitely be rolled out of town...or anywhere.....) but whatever real estate laws and logic laws, Y’ALL ARE EVICTED, DOGS!!!!

I have said before that we should all be blessed enough to have Christine Baranski’s wig budget but I have to say - it ain’t as great here as it was in the Mamma Mia movies. Sure, it is better than about 99% of all TV wigs but it does have some texture and seam problems (look at that part!) which make it look far too unrealistic (because this movie IS SO REALISTIC). Clearly the wig budget in this movie went directly to Our Lady of Perpetual Wigs, Dolly.

And of course it did! Dolly demands only the best and finest wigs for her performance as ANGEL and I honestly cannot disagree with that! These wigs are MADE FOR AN ANGEL. Also when this part of the movie happened, my daughter confided in me that she’s always wanted to sit on a cloud (SAME, GIRL) but only Dolly can sit on clouds. Truly, Dolly is an angel in real life and maybe this movie actually is grounded in reality because I don’t even think Dolly required costuming or CGI effects. This is just how Dolly enters every room. ANGEL ELEGANZA! 

In the context of the film, however, Dolly is all the ghosts of a Christmas Carol rolled into one angel, sent to show the evil Christine Baranski the real meaning of Christmas and not being a person who wants to evict an entire town. 

She is aided by Christine Baranski’s put-upon assistant who is somehow an angel in training (a very realistic job title!!!!) I have to say that my very favorite parts of this movie are when Dolly shows up either in life or green screen just sitting on random furniture or appliances in Christine Baranski’s house in her pristinely white open toe heels with pantyhose underneath. THIS IS THE DREAM. Also her wigs are absolute perfection. Please take note, all wig budgets: GET YOURSELF A DOLLY WIG BUDGET OR NAH.

ALSO JENIFER LEWIS IS IN THIS!!! I think she plays a hairdresser and also Christine Baranski’s long lost best friend but mainly she plays my fashion, afro, and jewelry icon who I absolutely never want to be apart from ever. Much like Christine Baranski’s wig budget, may we all be blessed by Jenifer Lewis saying “it’s ok baby” to us at least once in our stupid lives. 

Anyway, the attractive townspeople in J Crew literally have ONE DAY to pack up all of their earthly sweaters and find new sweater barns to inhabit and roll all their Christmas dogs away THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS but instead decide to just RESIST (whatever that means, amiright?) and form a calming circle (which is actually super not calm and involves a lot of choreography) and just try to will Christine Baranski to do the right thing somehow.

BUT CHRISTINE IS AT A LOCAL BAR WHICH LOOKS LIKE SOMEONE’S LIVING ROOM AND WHICH HAS A BARMAID WHO IS AN ACTUAL CHILD. God bless this beautiful mess of a movie and Christine Baranski’s wig budget which somehow got better or maybe it’s just the lighting. Anyway, Christine Baranski finds out some terrible truths from this alcohol swigging child and also they share beautiful harmonies in a duet which I couldn’t possibly hum for you ever again. 

Also Treat Williams is in this!! He plays Christine Baranski’s old flame who she broke up with because she saw him with an engagement ring (FOR HER) near some lady at the most dodgy 70s disco nightmare in a school gym and decided to hook up with someone else and (!) have a secret baby which her dad made her give up! WHAT. Also, her dad had a lamp from THE SQUARE which now exists in Treat Williams’ olde curiosity shoppe and has a convenient bible in it which explains that her long-lost baby is now the preacher of THE SQUARE.

IF YOU ARE EVEN TRYING TO FOLLOW A PLOT AT THIS POINT I SALUTE YOU. Also much like everything Dolly touches, there is for sure a lot of Jesusy stuff here but the kind where black people and LGBTQ people go to the same church as the boring white people and everyone loves each other so fine? 

ALSO THERE IS A TERRIBLE SUBPLOT INVOLVING THE NEAR DEATH OF THAT BARMAID CHILD! My daughter found it very triggering and I found it beyond the valley of unnecessary but this is also a movie in which Christine Baranski almost runs over her brain doctor with her car TWICE AND ALSO DID I MENTION CHRISTINE BARANSKI MIGHT HAVE A BRAIN TUMOR IN THIS MOVIE YES REALLY.

In the end, absolutely nothing involved in this ramshackle nonsense plot matters at all because everyone decides to make the right life decisions and also not die from brain tumor or injuries OR sell a town BUT ALSO become angels in whatever your definition of angel is! And I hope your definition is: DOLLY PARTON.

I AM EXHAUSTED BY MY LOVE FOR THIS MOVIE AND DOLLY PARTON. 

Truly, nothing about this movie exists in reality but this year has been the most surreal year ever so I’m pretty sure this movie saved 2020? Or at least 2020′s Christmas.

VERDICT: WURQS

Sometimes, there is a movie that so boldly defies the constructs of logic, time, plot, society, reality or gravity that we have to collectively decide if we can accept it as it is or let our eyeballs roll into the Mediterranean. And then sometimes that movie has a sequel. This is that sequel. This is 2018. Our lives are a garbage fire and this movie is a chardonnay soaked poncho blowing in the fake Greek breeze. I suggest we soak it up because it might be all we have left that might bring us joy. EVEN THE WIGS. Let’s discuss. 

We begin 10 years after the last movie (or maybe just 5? Or maybe sometime in the early aughts for the flashback timeline to work or maybe just who cares?) and we are dealt a terrifying blow that no movie should ever start with: MERYL STREEP IS DEAD. WHAT. NO. WHY THOUGH. Like everything in this movie, it is not explained why or how this happened. It is just something we must sadly accept and move on to learning more about her former self as played by Lily James because just go with it.

Back in England (?) of 1979 (??? again, do NOT do the math), Meryl Streep aka Lily James aka Donna has just graduated from college with her two best gal pals (aka the Dynamos) and has used it as a forum for singing b-side ABBA songs. Most of the a-side ABBA songs were used in the last movie so just take what you can get. 

Lily James is fine and doesn’t wear a wig and is perpetually tan and being called brave and has a nice singing voice and falls in water a lot. She is certainly no Meryl Streep but we must all count our lucky stars that Young Donna was not played by Anne Hathaway or (SHUDDER) Taylor Swift. THINK ABOUT THAT. Her two gal pals (aka young Tanya aka Christine Baranski and young Rosie aka Julie Walters) do have wigs and they are actually ok! The pixie cut on Rosie is a little upsetting but it’ll do in a pinch and this Tanya bob is 1000x better than anything Evangelline Lilly wore in Ant-Man.

The most troubling part of these flashbacks with Tanya and Rosie is that we are led to believe that their fabulous girl band, DONNA AND THE DYNAMOS are not actually as fabulous or world-renowned as the first movie (or stage play) would have had us believe. I guess they just performed maybe in college and had some great bellbottom costumes and ultimately just performed once for a few Greek people at some rando restaurant? Huh? Still, great bellbottoms.

We also meet the young versions of all of Amanda Seyfried’s would-be dads! First up is Young Sam (aka Colin Firth) in this busted ass wig. Man wigs are always bad and this one is...not great. This is the best wig of the trio and he’s the best singer of the dads, though, and gets the one non-b-side: WATERLOO! As performed by a French waitstaff in Napoleon costumes because OF COURSE.

Back to that hair: please someone make better man wigs.

We then meet Young Bill (aka Stellan Skarsgard). He is absolutely the most handsome of the dads but is wig is: WOOF.

Even covered up in a sailor hat: I see you, wig.

We then meet Young Sam (aka Pierce Brosnan) - Donna’s ain’ true love who she ends up with before dying for some reason. Sadly, Young Sam is the least attractive and has the worst wig of all the dads.

LOOK AT THIS SCRAGGLY ASS THING. When he ultimately breaks Donna’s heart I wasn’t even sad (also because we know they get back together) because GOODBYE BAD WIG.

Back in present day (????) all the dads are looking good and wigless and having the goddamned time of their lives dancing on boats and wearing whatever the hell quilted shirts because WHO EVEN CARES YOU DO YOU. There are many many more b-side ABBA songs to be sung!

A friend of mine described the musical sequences as feeling like karaoke videos which vaguely have a plot but really make no sense. This is exactly right and the whole movie basically is a long strung together collection of karaoke videos which as a whole add up to less than nothing plot-wise but truly everything fun-wise.

Speaking of fun: Christine Baranski and Julie Walters.These two ladies are having the wine-soaked Mediterranean girls trip of our goddamned dreams. Julie is wig-less and Christine’s wig is as perfect as her high kicks. The quality of this wig - the texture and perfect imperfections - rival perhaps only Julianna Margulies as far as wigs you could wear every day to work and fool all of America’s moms in the process. And for that, this movie clearly has the correct priorities. May we all be blessed with Christine Baranski’s wig budget someday in our lives. 

WAIT I TAKE IT BACK. MAY WE ALL BE BLESSED WITH CHER’S WIG BUDGET. So yes - EFFING CHER is in the movie. Yes, she is 3 years older than her “daughter,” Meryl Streep but as I said: DO NOT DO MATH IN RELATION TO THIS MOVIE. 

So here’s the thing: if we view this as hair that Cher is passing off as real hair, then....this wig is a no for me. But who are we kidding? Cher hasn’t showed up without a wig in almost as long as our Lady of Perpetual Wigs, Dolly Parton so of COURSE WE ARE SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE THIS IS A WIG IN THE CONTEXT OF THE MOVIE. So on that level, this wig is basically RuPaul quality which is to say: PERFECT.

Also Cher wears 2 WIGS (and this second one is truly blessed by Mama Ru) so: yes, we should definitely believe these are just great wigs. And like everything in this movie: JUST GO WITH IT HAVE FUN. This movie is a fever dream of nonsense but OH MY GOD do I want to just live in it.

I truly believe that the only antidote for the garbage fire of 2018 is Cher walking down some stairs in a silver tinsel bolero singing “Fernando” to Andy Garcia wearing a neckerchief while fireworks go off in the background and 200 gay men applaud (I saw this in Chelsea). If this scene cannot cure what ails you, then we are all just doomed. 

Oh and Meryl DOES show up in the end to sing us all into a sobfest and why did they have to kill her off again? SOBBING.

In the end, my verdict was a tough call because all 3 young dad wigs are so godawful but both young and old Christine Baranski wigs are wonderful and: EFFING CHER. Since there is no math in this movie, and just because, I’ve gotta go with Cher.

VERDICT: WURQS

OSCAR. SEASON. IS. HERE.

This movie only has one wig but it is worn by DAME JUDI DENCH so attention must be paid!!! Also if you like super pretentious movies about THE TROUBLES and have found a way to be ok with Kenneth Branagh, this movie is for you! Also that one wig! Let’s discuss!

I don’t like Kenneth Branagh for a wide range of offenses from cheating on Emma Thompson to directing Thor AND DUNKIRK but everyone seems to just LOVE this movie so fine I watched it. If you want to understand THE TROUBLES better, please watch the incomparable Derry Girls THE END PERIODT. This movie is set a good 30 years prior in 60s Belfast where “Buddy” (who is honestly a very adorable kid) plays Branagh as a boy during a very scary and violent chapter of Northern Ireland history. The film begins with sweeping color aerials of Belfast then goes back to B&W times IN B&W!! IT IS SUCH A PRETENTIOUS CHOICE I CAN’T YOU GUYS.

Branagh never misses an opportunity to PRETENTION just a little bit MORE STILL by framing everyone in every goddamned doorway or window, canting angles, beholding the magic of TV and film by using half the budget on archival footage and even getting so meta as to HAVE THE KID STANDING IN FOR HIMSELF READING A THOR COMIC BOOK! NO!

Also his parents are just SO ATTRACTIVE because they’re played by that bitch from Outlander and that dude from 50 Shades of Grey (I’ve watched neither but I understand the themes are SEX) that this childhood fantasy/nightmare truly feels like a very pretty fairy tale sometimes.

Anyway, the only wig present is on the head of DAME JUDI DENCH as Granny and truly: may we all be blessed with Dame Judi Dench’s wig budget someday. I assume that when one becomes a Dame, the Queen bestows wig approval as well. THE ULTIMATE HONOR! 

DAME JUDI DENCH can do no wrong, and neither can this wig because it does the best thing a wig can do: NOT LOOK LIKE A WIG. It looks like hair (I’m sure the B&W photography helps?), has lovely lowlights and highlights, has no noticeable seams, is not distracting, and is age appropriate. It’s basically the one thing in this movie that I applaud. 

ONE CAN ONLY APPLAUD DAME JUDI DENCH EVER and truly - she is wonderful and magical in this role (the kid ain’t bad either!) But really folks - just give people dame-worthy wig budgets and maybe more wigs will wurq!

Despite the performances (INCLUDING THAT OF THIS STELLAR WIG!) this movie just was too pretentious for me (GET YOURSELF TO DERRY GIRLS YOU GUYS). But I cannot deny this powerful wig.

VERDICT: WURQS