Connie and Carla rock the theatre

Girls shouldn't be crass, boys shouldn't wear dresses and movies shouldn't be this crazy, but Connie and Carla does all of that and more. It's humorous and tragic, outrageous and close to home, an absolute must-see.

At the outset, Connie and Carla is a cheesy flick whose main characters Connie (Nia Vardalos of My Big Fat Greek Wedding) and Carla (Toni Collette) redefine the idea of "bimbos." It's stupid and hilarious, incorporating the brainless blonds into a cocaine accident the likes of which might have been seen in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. On the run from a Russian hit man, the girls decide to hide out in L.A. as drag queens.

Although it seems like the movie can only get worse from there, it undergoes a major personality change and gets serious. This is not to say that the jokes are left behind and all goes to drama. Quite the contrary, the viciously stereotypical cracks are played right up to the end. The characters do, however, become more genuine; their motives become twisted, convoluted and deep; they show their weaknesses and insecurities, voice their true beliefs and, in short, flesh out.

The actors are all spectacularly versatile, tackling the flip-flop from two to three dimensions beautifully. David Duchovny who plays Jeff, the straight brother of an out-and-out drag queen, pulls off a perfectly believable metamorphosis from a tortured man trying to deal with his brother's weird life to an open-minded individual. Vardalos surpasses even him in developing strength and consistency, but that may have something to do with the fact that she wrote the film.

What Connie begins to expose, with much help from the rest of the outstanding cast, is how wrong society is in the way it judges people, specifically women and homosexuals. She attacks social barriers that divide strangers, lovers and even brothers. She shows that being true to oneself is the most important thing a person can do. Connie and Carla is, finally, an existentialist piece: Connie is a girl very much alone, rushing madly through an absurd world, searching for understanding and acceptance.

The film is brilliant. It transitions rather smoothly through as many plot changes as The Rocky Horror Picture Show--from which it steals "The Time Warp"--and is about as outrageous. Yet it keeps its power and dignity intact, delivering a touching, poignant ending. It carries a message this nation needs to hear embedded in the base comedy it loves.

Connie and Carla is rated PG-13 for thematic elements, sexual humor and drug references. It runs 98 minutes only at the E Street Cinema.