Desperate Living

Desperate Living (1977) is a John Waters cult comedy-crime film you can watch online on iFILM. Shot in Baltimore on a budget of $65,000 under his Dreamland and Charm City Productions banner, it stands apart in his filmography as the one movie he made without his frequent collaborator Divine — a deliberate choice that shifted the focus entirely onto his female cast.

After housewife Peggy Gravel (Mink Stole) and her enormous maid Grizelda (Jean Hill) accidentally kill Peggy's husband, they flee to Mortville — a hidden town run by the ridiculous Queen Carlotta (Edith Massey), populated exclusively by outcasts, criminals and people too strange for anywhere else. Liz Renay plays Muffy St. Jacques, resident glamour-misfit.

Waters built Mortville as a parody of small-town American society pushed to its most grotesque extreme. The film runs 91 minutes and has lost none of its abrasive energy in the decades since. Stream Desperate Living (1977) online on iFILM.