The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert

This brash, liberating and poignant road movie follows two drag queens and a transexual woman as they travel in a silver bus - 'Priscilla' - from Sydney to a gig in Alice Springs. 'Les Girls' are Bernadette, an ageing transsexual (Stamp), sharp-tongued Felicia (Pearce) and sensitive-flower Mitzi (Weaver), and this celebration of camp takes them where no lip-synching divas have ever been before. Unlike the bus, the film never gets bogged down, driven forward inexorably by naff disco tunes and crackling dialogue. Most impressive is the Fellini-esque panache writer/director Elliott brings to the visuals, isolating the extravagantly dressed figures in astonishing, orange-tinted landscapes and staging the production numbers like a frustrated director of musicals. Excellent, anchoring performances - it's hard not to be swept along.