Showgirls

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This article is about the film Showgirls (1995 film). For other uses, see Showgirl (disambiguation).
Showgirls (1995 film)
A single leg parts the credits, with the protagonist's head on top.
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Paul Verhoeven
Produced by Lynn Ehrensperger
Charles Evans[1]
Mario Kassar
Alan Marshall
Written by Joe Eszterhas
Starring Elizabeth Berkley
Kyle MacLachlan
Gina Gershon
Glenn Plummer
Robert Davi
Alan Rachins
Gina Ravera
Music by David A. Stewart
Cinematography Jost Vacano
Editing by Mark Goldblatt
Mark Helfrich
Studio Carolco Pictures
Distributed by MGM Distribution Co.
United Artists
Release date(s) September 22, 1995 (1995-09-22)
Running time 131 minutes
128 minutes (Edited cut)
Country France
United States
Language English
Budget $45 million
Box office $37,702,961 (Worldwide)[2]

Showgirls is a 1995 American drama film directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring former teen actress Elizabeth Berkley, Kyle MacLachlan, and Gina Gershon. The film centres around a street-smart drifter who ventures to Las Vegas and climbs the seedy hierarchy from stripper to showgirl.

Produced on a then-sizeable budget of approximately $45 million, significant controversy and hype surrounding the film's amounts of sex and nudity preceded its theatrical release. In the United States, the film was rated NC-17 for "nudity and erotic sexuality throughout, some graphic language and sexual violence." Showgirls was the first and currently only NC-17 rated film to be given a wide release in mainstream theaters.[3] Distributor United Artists dispatched several hundred staffers to theaters across North America playing Showgirls in order to assure that patrons would not be sneaking into the theater from other films, and to make sure the filmgoers were over the age of 17.

Despite a poor theatrical and critical consensus, Showgirls enjoyed success on the home video market, generating more than $100 million from video rentals [4] and became one of MGM's top 20 all-time bestsellers.[5] For its video premiere, Verhoeven prepared an R-rated cut for rental outlets that would not carry NC-17 films. This edited version runs 3 minutes shorter (128 minutes) and deletes some of the more graphic footage. While it has been consistently ranked as one of the worst films ever made, Showgirls has become regarded as a cult classic and was released on Blu-ray in June 2010.[6]

Contents

[edit] Plot

 This article's plot summary may be too long or excessively detailed. Please help improve it by removing unnecessary details and making it more concise. (January 2012)

A young woman is hitch hiking from what appears to be a truck stop; snow capped mountains are seen in the distance which sets it either in Colorado or an upstate U.S. state. A pickup truck pulls over for her, driven by a man who looks like a shady character. The young woman is unsure about whether she should accept the ride, but gets in cautiously when the man tells her he's going to Vegas. She tells him her name is Nomi Malone (Elizabeth Berkley) and that she's going to Vegas to dance. When the man tries to hit on her, Nomi pulls out a switchblade. After the man freaks and almost causes a collision with a tractor trailer, Nomi agrees to put the knife away. Once they get to Las Vegas, the man takes Nomi to a casino under the pretense of getting her a job; he convinces Nomi to leave her suitcase inside the truck. Inside the casino, he leaves her with ten dollars at a slot machine, then disappears; by the time Nomi realizes what has happened, she returns to the parking lot to find his truck gone, the man having abandoned her and stolen her suitcase. As Nomi is crying and banging her fists on the side of a nearby car, the car's owner, Molly (Gina Ravera), a seamstress, confronts her. The impulsive Nomi dashes out into traffic, but Molly pulls her back just in time. After talking and discovering Nomi does not have any family or place to go, Molly takes her into her trailer park home.

Two months later. Nomi gets a job as a stripper at the sleazy Cheetah's Topless Club which is managed and run by the sleazy Al Torres (Robert Davi) who also appears as the club's MC. Nomi considers herself a dancer, and she apparently sees that the Cheetah is a place where she can do this and still make a living. While out dancing for fun at a nightclub called The Crave Club, Nomi meets a bouncer named James Smith (Glenn Plummer). James admires her dancing and Nomi is flattered until he dares to criticize what she's doing. In retaliation, Nomi kicks him between the legs and he falls into another patron, sparking a brawl. Nomi delights in what she's done, smiling to herself as all the men begin to throw punches, until someone recognizes her as the instigator and she's taken to jail. James bails her out the next morning, but Nomi still will not forgive him for his comments.

One night Nomi accompanies Molly backstage at Goddess, the topless Vegas show at the Stardust Hotel where Molly works as the costume seamstress. Since it is Nomi's dream to be a showgirl, she is thrilled to watch the show and see the backstage area. Molly introduces her to Cristal Connors (Gina Gershon), the diva-like star of the show. Molly tells Cristal that Nomi is a dancer as well, but when Nomi tells her she dances at the Cheetah, Cristal derisively tells Nomi that what she does is akin to prostitution. Nomi becomes furious, and her reaction intrigues Cristal, who is bisexual and apparently attracted to Nomi.

The next evening, Cristal and her cocaine-snorting boyfriend Zach Carey (Kyle MacLachlan), the entertainment director at the Stardust, visit the Cheetah and pay Nomi $500 for a lap dance. Nomi does not want to do the private dance, for fear it will prove her to be the prostitute Cristal made her out to be, but is forced to do so by Torres, much to her embarrassment. James, who lurks in the Cheetah and sees Nomi performing her private dance with Zack and Cristal, confronts Nomi at her home the next day. He feels that Nomi has too much talent to be performing as a stripper, not to mention that he, too, considers it to be something similar to prostitution. Nomi angrily rebuffs him once more.

A few days later, Nomi discovers that Cristal has arranged for her to have an audition as an ensemble dancer in Goddess. At the audition, the callous director of Goddess, Tony Moss (Alan Rachins), refers to Nomi as "Pollyanna" because of her outfit. Nomi dashes backstage, removes her blouse and dances in her underwear, but she notices Cristal watching silently from the darkened theater. When Nomi is told by Moss to use ice to make her nipples hard for the second part of the audition, she gets upset and leaves. Cristal approaches her as she cries backstage, and Nomi tells Cristal that she hates her.

Leaving the Stardust upset, Nomi finds James working as a bellhop and he takes her back to his apartment. They have an intimate moment as James demonstrates a dance number that he conceived in honor of Nomi and her career as a private dancer.

Despite the audition, Nomi gets the job and immediately quits the Cheetah and mouths off to Al Torres one final time. She excitedly rushes over to tell James about her new job, but she finds him having an intimate moment with another woman; ironically the woman is Penny (Rena Riffel), one of her former co-dancers at the Cheetah.

Meeting with the producers of Goddess, Nomi wears a brand new dress she bought at Versace, mispronouncing it "Vur-SAYSS" in front of everyone. Nobody corrects her on it except Zach, who tells her she looks beautiful and has great taste. Nomi makes her debut the next night at the Goddess show, and she gets many compliments from the cast members and stagehands alike for her talent at her dance moves.

Afterwords, Cristal calls a truce and takes Nomi out for lunch, and they discover they have similar backgrounds; both have had troubled and unhappy childhoods and left home at a young age to make something of themselves. Cristal, however, calls Nomi a whore again, which Nomi angrily denies. The way Cristal sees it, they are all whores because they exchange sexual titillation for cash. Cristal also acknowledges that she is attracted to Nomi, as well as "plays for both teams", but Nomi does not consider herself bisexual. Nevertheless, she allows Cristal to engage her in an erotic dance when they are alone in the theater at the Stardust, allowing Cristal to pull down her top and caress her bare breasts. As she leans in for a kiss, Cristal sneers at Nomi and says: "See, darlin? You ARE a whore." Nomi storms out again in a fury.

From this point on, the two are rivals once more. Cristal repeatedly takes malicious swipes at Nomi on and off stage in a never-ending attempt to portray Nomi as a cheap whore, including sending Nomi on a promotional appearance with Zach's assistant, Phil Newkirk (Greg Travis). Cristal knows from experience that Nomi will be approached to have sex for cash. Nomi furiously rejects Phil's proposition and she mistakenly thinks she has an ally in Zach, who pretends to bawl Phil out over the incident.

Meanwhile, a rivalry between two other backing dancers at Goddess comes to a head and one of them sabotages the other on stage by dropping beads where she is dancing. She falls and injures herself, and is unable to continue in the show. Nomi sees the beads being dropped but can do nothing to stop the accident, and afterwards remains silent about the cause, to the relief of the culprit.

One night, Nomi agrees to a car ride from Zach, and they end up at his large estate outside of the city. Nomi seduces Zach, and they have sex in his swimming pool. As Nomi leaves the next morning, Zack mentions that there is an audition for Cristal's new understudy to replace the dancer who was injured. Zach tells Nomi she should try out for the position.

At the audition, Cristal senses a shift in the tide; Zach suggests Nomi as Cristal's understudy, and the choreographer agrees that Nomi has what it takes. Tony Moss disagrees but makes a remark about Cristal's age. Cristal also finds out that Zach slept with Nomi, and Zach gloats over it. When Nomi gets the position as understudy, Cristal is furious, and Nomi feels she finally has the upper hand. As a result, Cristal threatens to leave the show, and the producers reverse their decision. Nomi is, of course, furious; her clumsy grab for power has alienated most of the other dancers, and now Cristal seems to be in control.

Nomi goes to see James perform his dance and music number at the Crave Club, where he and his co-dancers are booed off the stage. James takes the bad experience it fairly well, telling Nomi that he is giving up dancing to work in a grocery store now that his girlfriend, Penny, is now pregnant. Nomi bids him farewell.

During the performance of Goddess that night, Cristal taunts on-stage Nomi about her disappointment. As the dancers leave the stage, Nomi impulsively pushes Cristal down a flight of stairs which leads to the dressing rooms, injuring her badly and sending her to the hospital. Molly knows Nomi pushed Cristal, but another dancer (the same one who injured the rival dancer earlier and whom Nomi covered for) backs up Nomi's story that Cristal slipped and pretends that she saw the whole thing. With Cristal unable to perform, Nomi ends up getting Cristal's lead in the show, where she makes a dazzling debut and is suddenly the talk of the town.

Things seem to be going well for Nomi; she has finally secured the fame and fortune she initially sought. However, at the opening night party, Molly is brutally raped and beaten by famous musician Andrew Carver (William Shockley) and his two security guards. Molly is taken to the hospital to treat her injuries, and Zach tells Nomi that they will give Molly some money to keep quiet; their primary interest is in protecting their high-profile celebrity client, not in seeking justice for Molly.

When Nomi decides to make an anonymous phone call to the police, Zach then confronts her with the truth he has just discovered. Apparently, Zach made a background check on Nomi and became suspicious after learning that some of her references were false. After Zach also learned about Nomi's arrest several weeks earlier at the Crave Club, he acquired her fingerprints from her arrest and has a police file containing the truth: Nomi is actually a runaway and former prostitute named Polly Ann Costello from San Francisco. Back in 1989 at age 15, Polly's father murdered her mother and then killed himself in a drunken rage. Polly then ran away from a foster home in nearby Oakland, and has drifted around the country ever since. She changed her name several times and has been arrested several times in several states for an assortment of crimes ranging from drug possession, to prostitution, and assault with a deadly weapon.

Finally confronted with her seedy past being made public, and frightened at the selfish and greedy person she has become and what lies ahead, Nomi decides to flee Las Vegas, but not before she pays a visit to Andrew Carver. Because Carver has made propositions to her from the moment he met her, Nomi has no problem inviting herself up to his hotel room. Once they are alone, she strips for him, but then pulls out a switchblade and swears that she will kill him if he makes a sound. She then proceeds to kick him repeatedly with her boots until he is bloodied and unconscious. Nomi then slips out of the room and away from his bodyguards.

Later, Nomi arrives at the hospital and bids goodbye to a semi-conscious Molly, informing her that she obtained some kind of vengeance for her by beating Andrew Carver up. Nomi also visits the hospital room of Cristal, who doesn't seem particularly bitter about Nomi's stunt that she pulled. Cristal tells Nomi that she, too, got ahead by similar means. "There's always someone younger and hungrier than you coming down the stairs behind you," Cristal says. Nomi says goodbye, but grants Cristal a passionate kiss before leaving.

The movie comes full circle when Nomi coincidentally hitches a ride to Los Angeles with the very same guy who robbed her in the beginning, and attacks him for what he did to her, and both drive in the direction of L.A.

[edit] Cast

[edit] Reception

Showgirls' subject matter was relatively controversial. The film's gratuitous nudity, simulated sex, and $2 million screenplay[7] (written by Joe Eszterhas, who had worked with director Paul Verhoeven before) did not lend itself to what might have been a provocative film. The 1998 film Burn Hollywood Burn, also written by Eszterhas, contains a reference to Showgirls as a "terrible" film.

Showgirls received a 12% 'Rotten' rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert, following a relatively mild negative review, wrote that Showgirls received "some bad reviews, but it wasn't completely terrible,"[8] but the movie remains heralded as one of cinema's worst.

The film was the winner of a then-record seven 1995 Golden Raspberry Awards (from a record 13 nominations) including Worst Picture, Worst Actress (Elizabeth Berkley), Worst Director (Paul Verhoeven), Worst Screenplay (Joe Eszterhas), Worst New Star (Elizabeth Berkley), Worst Screen Couple ("any combination of two people (or two body parts)") and Worst Original Song (David A. Stewart and Terry Hall for "Walk Into the Wind"). Verhoeven gamely appeared in person at the Razzies ceremony to accept his award for Worst Director; Showgirls would later win a record-setting eighth Razzie Award for Worst Picture of the Last Decade in 2000. It was soon tied with Battlefield Earth for winning the most Razzies in a single year, a record soon broken when I Know Who Killed Me won eight trophies in 2008, and was broken again when Battlefield Earth won a ninth Razzie in 2010.

Due to Showgirls' poor reception, Striptease, a 1996 film about nude dancers starring Demi Moore, had to be distanced from Showgirls in advertisements;[9] Striptease nonetheless won the next year's Razzie Award for Worst Picture. Rena Riffel, who played Penny/Hope in Showgirls, also was cast in Striptease, as Tiffany Glass.

The term "Showgirls-bad" has been adopted by film critics and fans to refer to films considered guilty pleasures, or "so-bad-they're-good".[10][11][12] To date Showgirls is the highest-grossing NC-17 production earning $20,350,754 at the North American Box Office.[13]

[edit] Cult status

Since its release, the film has achieved cult status. According to writer Naomi Klein, ironic enjoyment of the film initially arose among those with the video before MGM capitalized on the idea. MGM noticed the video was performing well because "trendy twenty-somethings were throwing Showgirls irony parties, laughing sardonically at the implausibly poor screenplay and shrieking with horror at the aerobic sexual encounters".[14]

In the United States, Showgirls is shown at midnight movies alongside such films as The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. It is heralded as one of the best "bad movies", a camp classic in the vein of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Although the film was not successful when first released theatrically, it generated more than $100 million from video rentals [4] and became one of MGM's top 20 all-time bestsellers.[15]

The rights to show the film on TV were eventually purchased by the VH1 network. However, because of the film's rampant and gratuitous nudity, a censored version was created with black bras and panties digitally rendered to hide all exposed breasts and genitals. Also, several scenes were removed entirely. Berkley refused to redub her lines,[citation needed] so a noticeably different actress' voice can be heard on the soundtrack.

As revealed on the DVD release, a sign showing the distance to Los Angeles in the last shot of the film hinted at a sequel in which Nomi takes on Hollywood. The film was also ranked #36 on Entertainment Weekly magazine's "The Top 50 Cult Movies list.[16]

Recent years have seen a reevaluation of the movie's merits. Critics such as Jonathan Rosenbaum and Charles Taylor, as well as filmmaker Jacques Rivette, have gone on the record defending Showgirls as a serious satire. Actor Patrick Bristow, who plays choreographer Marty, defended the film as "not that bad" except "that horrible rape scene."[citation needed] Quentin Tarantino has stated that he enjoyed Showgirls, referring to it as the "only [...] other time in the last twenty years [that] a major studio made a full-on, gigantic, big-budget exploitation movie", comparing it to Mandingo.[17]

Showgirls has been compared to the 1950 film All About Eve as a remake, update, or rip-off of that film.[18]

[edit] Home media

In 2004, MGM released "The V.I.P. Edition" in a special boxed set containing two shot glasses, movie cards with drinking games on the back, a deck of playing cards, and a nude poster of Berkley with a pair of suction-cup pasties so viewers can play "pin the pasties on the showgirl." The DVD itself includes several bonus features, including a "how-to" tutorial for giving a lapdance hosted by real strippers, and a special "trivia track" feature that can be turned on or off. When left on, it adds humorous comments and factoids in the vein of VH1's Pop Up Video that relate to the scenes as they play out. It also includes "The Greatest Movie Ever Made: a commentary by David Schmader." In 2007, MGM re-released the V.I.P. edition DVD without the physical extras.

On June 15, 2010, MGM released a 15th Anniversary "Sinsational Edition" in a two-disc dual-format Blu-ray/DVD edition.[19] This edition contains most of the same bonus features as the VIP edition DVD, except the trivia text feature has been reformatted. The NC-17 edit of the film is used.

The trivia track on the 2010 edition contains some errors, such as a statement that some of the dancers featured in the film were recruited from the XFL football league cheerleaders, an impossibility as the XFL wasn't formed until 2000.

The film is classified as R18+ in New Zealand and Australia for its violence, offensive language, and sex scenes.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Charles Evans at the Internet Movie Database
  2. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114436/business
  3. ^ Weinraub, Bernard (July 21, 1995). "First Major Film With an NC-17 Rating Is Embraced by the Studio – New York Times". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990CE7DB1E31F932A15754C0A963958260. Retrieved 2008-05-21. 
  4. ^ a b Wiser, Paige. "The beauty of 'Showgirls'", Chicago Sun-Times, July 27, 2004
  5. ^ "MGM's official page for Showgirls DVD". classic-web.archive.org. 2007-04-28. Archived from the original on 2007-04-28. http://classic-web.archive.org/web/20070428172642/http://www.mgm.com/title_title.php?title_star=SHOWGRLS. Retrieved 2010-11-25. 
  6. ^ Rochlin, Margy (May 25, 2008). "Step by Step, the Showgirl Must Go On". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/25/arts/dance/25roch.html. Retrieved 2009-03-03. 
  7. ^ Maureen Dowd, "Bucks and Blondes: Joe Eszterhas Lives The Big Dream", New York Times, May 30, 1993.
  8. ^ Ebert, Roger. "An Alan Smithee Film Burn Hollywood Burn", Chicago Sun-Times, February 27, 1998.
  9. ^ Nashawaty, Chris. "Demi Goes Undercover: Moore's 'Striptease' Bumps into Trouble", Entertainment Weekly 04/26/96. Retrieved 16 August 2006.
  10. ^ "Anonymous review of ''Catwoman''". Porktartare.com. http://www.porktartare.com/sight/sight_reviews.html. Retrieved 2010-11-25. 
  11. ^ "Anonymous review of ''Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows'' by". Exclaim.ca. http://www.exclaim.ca/index.asp?layid=22&csid=5&csid1=390. Retrieved 2010-11-25. 
  12. ^ Sternbergh, Adam. "Springtime for the Undulating Curve of Shifting Expectations!" New York Magazine March 26, 2006
  13. ^ "Domestic Grosses by MPAA Rating – NC-17". Box Office Mojo. http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/domestic/mpaa.htm?page=NC-17&p=.htm. Retrieved 2008-08-16. 
  14. ^ Klein, Naomi, No Logo, Vintage Canada Edition, 2000, p. 79.
  15. ^ "MGM's official page for Showgirls DVD". classic-web.archive.org. 2007-04-28. Archived from the original on 2007-04-28. http://classic-web.archive.org/web/20070428172642/http://www.mgm.com/title_title.php?title_star=SHOWGRLS. Retrieved 2010-11-25. 
  16. ^ "The Cult 25: The Essential Left-Field Movie Hits Since '83". Entertainment Weekly. September 3, 2008. http://www.filmsite.org/cultfilmsew2.html. Retrieved 2008-09-04. 
  17. ^ Udovitch, Mim (1998). "Mim Udovitch/1996". In Peary, Gerald. Quentin Tarantino: Interviews. Univ. Press of Mississippi. pp. 172–173. ISBN 1578060516. 
  18. ^ "Showgirls Review - Jabootu's Bad Movie Dimension". Jabootu.com. http://www.jabootu.com/acolytes/brandiweed/showgirls.htm. Retrieved 2010-11-25. 
  19. ^ "Showgirls 15th Anniversary Blu-ray Announced". April 12, 2010. http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=4424. Retrieved 2010-04-12. 
  • Parish, James Robert (2006). Fiasco – A History of Hollywood’s Iconic Flops. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. pp. 359 pages.. ISBN 978-0-471-69159-4. 

[edit] External links

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