|
Showgirls (1995)
In director
Paul Verhoeven's erotic show-biz, big-budget sexploitation drama
(teamed up again with screenwriter Joe Eszterhas) - a misogynistic,
guilty-pleasure adult film with some unfortunate depictions of the
mistreatment of women; it was the first attempt of Hollywood
to mass market a studio film with an NC-17 rating (since the failure
of Caligula (1979)), although it was a tremendous flop (with
domestic box-office of only $20 million from a production budget
of $45 million). Verhoeven already had a reputation for RoboCop
(1987) and Basic Instinct (1992).
See Sex in Films for uncensored version
In subsequent years, the notorious
1990s film, with a soul-less, exploitative plot and mostly
repugnant characters, regained some of its status as a deliberately
campy and cult film, and found an audience among cult film-goers
(although it reportedly destroyed the career of star Elizabeth Berkley,
earlier noted for her role in the late 80s TV show Saved By the
Bell). The film was considered
senseless, violent, and actually sexually boring or desensitizing,
although it contained lots of gratuitous nudity.
It remains the highest-grossing NC-17 rated film of
all-time with almost double the box-office take of its next major
competitor, Henry & June (1990) at $11.6 million. A 15th Anniversary DVD version,
a "Sinsational" Edition, was released to commemorate its
longevity.
It had lots of controversial content - and was loaded
with very frequent and rampant nudity (almost to the point of being
boring), sexuality, notorious dialogue, unintentionally cheesy acting
and campy sleaze in a drama about the sex industry - it supposedly
provided an uncensored look at the backstage show-biz world of Las
Vegas strip clubs and shows.
- in the film's opening sequence, uneducated drifter
Nomi Malone (Elizabeth Berkley), purportedly with no family or
friends and carrying a single suitcase, hitchhiked from somewhere
342 miles north of Las Vegas; she was aided by a pickup-truck driver
named Jeff (Dewey Weber), but remained wary and pulled out her
switchblade knife to protect herself when he urged: "You can
sit a little bit closer if you want";
Nomie told him she was going to Vegas, not to win or gamble, but
to "dance"
- once they arrived in Vegas, the 23 year-old aspiring
dancer/actress was fooled into believing he would help her
find a job in a casino, but took off without her and stole her
suitcase; distraught, Nomi was befriended by a nearby stranger,
identified as casino costume designer-seamstress Molly Abrams (Gina
Ravera), who invited the abandoned, angry and upset Nomi to be
her roommate in her trailer, when Nomi told her she had no family
or friends, or place to go
|
|
Casino Costume Seamstress Molly Abrams (Gina Ravera)
|
Nomi - Wary of Pickup Truck Driver Jeff On The Drive to Vegas
|
- six weeks later, Molly invited Nomi to accompany
her to her costume-fitting job at Las Vegas' Stardust hotel, to
go backstage and then watch the show; Nomi was thrilled and entranced
by the energetic male and topless female dancers in the hot volcanic-themed
show titled "Goddess", especially new headliner Cristal
Connors (Gina Gershon), a bi-sexual diva dancer ("She's
dazzling, she's exciting, And she's very, very sexy")
- after the show, Cristal was congratulated by the
show director Tony Moss (Alan Rachins) and the Stardust's entertainment
director Zack Carey (Kyle MacLachlan), Cristal's boyfriend; Molly
urged Nomi to meet the diva performer Cristal in her private dressing
room after the show; after meeting Cristal, Nomi was asked where
she danced; when she answered the topless Cheetahs Club, Cristal
derisively denounced her sleazy place of work as a cover for prostitution:
"If it's at the Cheetah, It's not dancing, I know that much";
Nomi was insulted ("You don't know s--t") and stormed
off; nonetheless, Cristal appeared sexually attracted to Nomi
- instead of going to work at the Cheetahs, the upset
Nomi and Molly went dancing at the Crave Club, where she became
acquainted while briefly dancing with the club's dread-locked black
bouncer, James Smith (Glenn Plummer); the night ended with Nomi's
arrest for instigating a fight after she kneed him in the groin
for insulting her style of dancing ("You got potential. I
could teach you") - and a brawl broke out; he bailed her out
the next morning, and she was still angry at him: "I don't
need nobody to teach me to dance"; he called her a "bad-ass" and
told her she was responsible for his firing: "My head hurts,
my d--k hurts, And you got me fired from my f--kin' job";
she wanted nothing to do with him
Cheetahs Topless Lounge Characters
|
Manager Al Torres (Robert Davi)
|
New Dancer Penny (Rena Riffel)
|
Club Jokester Henrietta 'Mama' Bazoom (Lin Tucci)
|
- Nomi's no-show at work threatened her job, but she
was back the next night as one of the topless, pole-clinging
dancers at the low-class Cheetahs Club; part of the night's entertainment
was provided by buxom Henrietta 'Mama' Bazoom (Lin Tucci), known
as the "Queen of bazooms!", who told dirty jokes on stage,
and whose performance-trick was to flex her arms to lower her bustier
and expose her breasts; the manager of the club, Al
Torres (Robert Davi), detailed requirements
for a lap dance to new girl Penny (Rena Riffel), whose real name
was Hope: "Fifty bucks a pop, you take 'em in the back. Touch
and go. They touch, they go. You can touch them. They cannot touch
you...Now if they come, that's okay. If they take it out and come
all over you, call the bouncer, unless he gives you a big tip.
If he gives you a big tip, it's okay. You got that?"
- Al criticized Nomi for her lame excuses for missing
work and then propositioned her: "I'm gettin' real tired of
your s--t, kid. If you want to last longer than a week, you'll
give me a blow job. First, I get you used to the money, then I
make you swallow"
Nomi Dancing Onstage at the Cheetahs
With Zack and Cristal in the Audience
|
|
|
|
- watching Nomi (with stage name Heather) strip topless
and then pole dance from the audience were Zack Carey
and cocaine-using girlfriend Cristal, who suggested: "I'll buy
her for you"; afterwards, the reluctant Nomi was paid a top price
of $500 dollars to perform a private and extended lap dance for
Zack - Cristal's gift to him, while she watched from afar; it was
Cristal's way of humiliating Nomi and proving that she was 'prostituting'
herself at the Cheetahs; it ended up being a totally-nude, frenzied,
hip-grinding, orgasmic experience for Zack, and seemed to also
turn Cristal on; James was lurking around in the club and sneaked
a look at the lap dance from the room's entrance before he was
told to leave; after the performance, Cristal reacted: "That was
fun, wasn't it?" and Zack blurted out: "You're such a bitch!"
|
|
|
The Threesome Voyeuristic Lap Dancing For Zack While
Cristal Watched
|
- the next morning, James visited Nomi in the trailer
park, and cautioned that she was more talented than the average
stripper: ("You got more natural talent when you dance than anybody
I've ever seen...You burn when you dance"), but he felt that she
was simply "prostituting" herself at the Cheetahs: ("You got some
s--t to learn. Dancing ain't f--kin'...You dance like when you
f--ked that guy last night....You f--k 'em without f--king 'em.
That's what you do. Well, it ain't right. You got too much talent
for it to be right"); she rebuffed him and told him to leave
- during one night's performance, Nomi was approached
by Zack's assistant Phil Newkirk (Greg Travis) from the Stardust
Hotel, offering her an audition for an open spot in the chorus
line of the "Goddess" show; Nomi suspected that Cristal was behind
the invitation to try-out ("She sent you, didn't she?")
- the next morning at the showgirl
audition, the crass and crude Tony Moss (Alan
Rachins) called Nomi a "Pollyanna" (due to her discreet costume) before
introducing himself: ("Okay,
ladies. I'm Tony Moss. I produce this show. Some of you have probably
heard that I'm a prick - I am a prick. I got one interest here, and
that's the show. I don't care whether you live or die. I want to see
ya dance and I want to see ya smile. I can't use you if you can't smile,
I can't use you if you can't show, I can't use you if you can't sell.
Let me take a look at ya, spread out!");
Nomi ran backstage and removed her outfit to dance in her purple bra
and black thong panties underwear
- during a line-up of dancers, he made insulting comments about one of the dancer's
stacked chest: ("Marty, look at these tits. What are these, watermelons?
This is a stage, babe, not a patch. See ya"); he also criticized another
dancer's prominent ears, and another's weight ("Come
back when you've f--ked some of this baby fat off. See ya!")
- after a brief practice of the dance routine with
a choreographer, Nomi noticed the arrival of Cristal to quietly
watch while sitting in the audience section; Moss picked
out only three of the dancers to remain - Nomi and two others,
Dancer (Bethany Chesser) and Yoga Dancer (Maria Diaz)
- the threesome were
then ordered to go topless: ("Okay, show me your tits. I got a
topless show. Let me see your tits") and to wildly dance: "Come on,
ladies! Sell! Sell your bodies!"; Moss summarily dismissed the other
two dancers, and then proceeded to make
some nasty comments about Nomi's nipples - and humiliated her by
requesting that she ice her nipples to make them harder: ("You
got somethin' wrong with your nipples?...They're not stickin' up.
Stick 'em up....Play with 'em a little bit. Pinch 'em a little.
You want me to do it for ya, I'll do it...I'm erect. Why aren't
you erect? Here, put some ice on 'em");
after an outburst, Nomi stormed off; Cristal followed her backstage
and admitted why she had arranged for Nomi to be selected: "Maybe
I like the way you dance. Maybe I like you. What difference does
it make?"; Nomi said she hated Cristal for her 'enjoyment' of her
harsh treatment
- outside the Stardust after the audition, James (working
as a hotel bellhop) again stated how Nomi's aspirations for a glamorous
topless showgirl career meant the exploitation of her talent: "You
don't want to be in this kind of show. Here, they pretend
they want something else, And you still show them tits and ass";
for talking to Nomi during his work, James was fired; he drove
her back to his apartment in a pink convertible where he showed
her some of his choreographed dance moves for her before they had
a brief sexual fling; she denied him sex due to her period, and
also affirmed: "You can f--k me when you love me"
- it was confirmed that Nomi had been given the job
to dance in the "Goddess" show, so she quit her leggy, pole-dancing
Cheetahs job; she made one last visit to the club to tell Al and Henrietta:
"I'll never come back" - when Al retorted: "You're a f--king stripper.
Don't you get it?", she rejected his put-down: "I'm a dancer!"
- then, she rushed over to tell James about her new
job, but she found him having intimate relations with Penny, her
ex-co-dancer from the Cheetahs Club; the double-crossing James
had offered Penny the same dance routine and promises that he had
presented to Nomi; Nomi promptly broke up with him [Much later
in the film, James quit choreographing dance numbers after a disastrous
show at The Crave Club, and he took a grocery store job after impregnating Penny]
- intense rehearsals
for the show were conducted by choreographer Gay Carpenter (Michelle
Johnston) and Marty (Patrick Bristow), including hip "Thrust
It"
exercises, before her first show - that very evening
|
|
|
Nomi's First "Goddess" Show
|
- the show went smoothly, and the aspiring Nomi was
rewarded with a bouquet of flowers from Zack at her dressing table;
during the next day's noon practice, Nomi found herself in an empty
Stardust showroom with Cristal, snorting cocaine; it was a pretense
to go out to lunch at Spago's; during their meal discussion, they
first talked about eating Doggie Chow in their past when they faced
hard times
- over champagne, they then became fixated on breast-talk -
Cristal claimed that she used to have "little bitty tits" until
she visited a plastic surgeon, and then she complimented Nomi's figure
- Cristal: "You have great tits. They're really beautiful." Nomi:
"Thank you." Cristal: "I like nice tits. I always have. How about
you?" Nomi: "I like having nice tits." Cristal: "How do you like
having 'em?" Nomi: "What do you mean?" Cristal: "You know what
I mean." Nomi: "I like having them in a nice dress or a tight top."
Cristal: "Hmm. You like to show 'em off."
- Nomi confessed that she felt like a "hooker" when
she showed off her breasts at the Cheetahs Club, although Cristal
reminded her that they both provided sexual entertainment for cash:
"You are a whore, darlin'....We all are. We take the cash, we cash
the check. We show them what they wannna see"; Nomi disagreed:
"Maybe you are a whore, Cristal, but I'm not," but Cristal again
stipulated: "You and me, we're exactly alike"; Nomi was angered:
"I'll never be like you!"; a love-hate relationship and
rivalry was developing between the two divas
|
|
|
Erotic Dance Between Cristal and Nomi
on Empty Stardust Stage Before Cristal Ripped Off Nomi's Top
and Fondled Her Before Attempting a Bi-Sexual Kiss
|
- upon their return to the Stardust show stage, they
competitively engaged in an erotic dance duo, when suddenly, Cristal
stripped Nomi of her complete top, to ogle her and to fondle her
breasts and tweak her nipples; she then approached slowly for a
bi-sexual kiss - and again reminded Nomi: "You see, darlin'? You
are a whore"; Nomi felt used by Cristal
and spit the word "Bitch!" at her before storming off
- Cristal's malicious intentions on and off the stage
were now clear - she would continue to imply and humiliate Nomi
by proving that she was basically a cheap whore who was prostituting
herself for money; Nomi was at first enticed when Cristal recommended
her for a promotional dance appearance at a boat show convention
coming to town in the next week, to be paid $1,000 dollars; however,
at the event when she was propositioned for a show, dinner, and sex
by a "high-roller" from Bangkok named Mr. Okida (Jim Ishida),
she felt degraded, rejected the offer ("Not me") and marched
away. When she confided with Zack about the issue, she thought he
was supportive when he reprimanded Newkirk for his actions, but she
had been fooled
- later during a stage show, two rival showgirls sabotaged
each other, leading to a serious knee injury for one of the girls,
Annie (Ungela Brockman). It left an opening for tryouts for the
position of Cristal's understudy. Meanwhile, behind Cristal's back,
Nomi was invited by Zack (in his red sports convertible) to his
magnificent estate. She complimented him about the lap dance ("I
liked it when you came"), and then after noticing his outdoor pool
with neon palm trees and a dolphin fountain, she stripped down
and dived in. He joined her with a champagne bottle and two glasses,
and poured the bubbly all over her face and body. In an overacted,
over-the-top swimming pool scene, she seduced him
and the two thrashed around during orgasmic activity below the
water level - it was a basic repeat of the earlier lap dance, but
under water
|
|
|
|
|
|
Nomi's Sexual Romp in Pool with Zack
|
- the next morning, Zack urged Nomi to consider trying
out for the understudy role at a noon audition against the other
rivals Nikki (Melinda Songer) and Julie (Melissa Williams), and
she won the competition. After finding out that Zack had slept
with Nomi, Cristal was jealous and furious and interfered with
the decision by threatening legal action and leaving the show,
resulting in Nomi's offer being withdrawn. Enraged now that Cristal
had the upper hand, Nomi vengefully pushed Cristal down the steep
flight of stairs leading from the stage (after a contentious biker
number between them), but she was cleared of blame by Julie, one
of the rival showgirls that Nomi had earlier covered for; however,
Molly saw the 'accident' and knew Nomi had caused it
- Cristal suffered a compound fracture of her right
hip, and thus Nomi became the headliner for the
show; after Nomi's successful opening-night, debut lead performance,
a premiere party was held at the luxurious Paradiso hotel; one
of the guests was famous celebrity musician Andrew Carver
(William Shockley) - one of Molly's idols; in the film's most violent
and traumatic sequence, Molly was gang-raped by Carver and his
two security guards in one of the hotel rooms; Zack and others
from the Stardust agreed to bribe Molly with hush-money to keep
the rape out of the news
- during the aftermath of Molly's rape and recovery
from a broken nose, Zack had conducted a background check on Nomi's
elusive and shady past after learning a number of nefarious things about her: (1) Nomi's
real name was Polly Ann Costello, (2) in 1989 when she was 15 years
old and living in San Francisco, her father murdered her mother
and then drunkenly committed suicide, (3) placed in a foster home
in Oakland, Polly ran away in 1990 and roamed through the country,
(4) she already had a rap sheet, for crack cocaine drug use and
possession, soliciting, and assault with a deadly weapon; Zack
pressured and blackmailed Nomi to not report Molly's assault to
the police
- not content with the lack of justice for Molly,
Nomi exercised vigilantism by meeting up with Carver in his Paradiso
Hotel room where she stripped, but then pulled out a switchblade
and violently assaulted him with her heavy boots; she then visited
Molly to inform her of the payback ("I just went to Carver. I kicked
the s--t out of him"), and then visited Cristal to apologize for
hurting her; Cristal, who had received a large cash payment for
the injury, admitted that she had gotten her first lead earlier
in life with the same tactic: ("There's always someone younger
and hungrier coming down the stairs behind you"); before
Nomi left, the two shared a passionate good-bye kiss
Nomi in Andrew Carver's Hotel Suite Before Her Vengeful Assault With Switchblade
and Her Boots
|
Passionate Goodbye Kiss Between Cristal and Nomi
|
- the film concluded with Nomi's departure from town
toward Los Angeles - again hitch-hiking - and hooking up with the
same truck driver who had swindled her in the film's opening; this
time, she held him at knifepoint and demanded her suitcase back
|
Nomi - Starstruck Watching the Stardust's "Goddess" Stage
Show Starring Cristal Connors
Cristal Connors (Gina Gershon) in Extravagant Topless "Goddess" Stage Show
Cristal with Boyfriend, Stardust Entertainment Director Zack Carey (Kyle
MacLachlan)
Nomi Meeting Cristal in Her Private Dressing Room After Stardust "Goddess"
Show
Crave Club Bouncer James Smith (Glenn Plummer)
Nomi Backstage at the Topless Cheetahs Club
In the Cheetahs Audience: Cristal and Zack, Before a Private Lap Dance
Show Producer Tony Moss Introducing Him to Group of Auditioners
Humiliating the Line Up of Contestants
Dancers' Run-Through of the Routine
The Three Selected Dancers
Stand-Off and Humiliation of Nomi and Her Nipples by Moss
Cristal Watching Audition From the Audience
Nomi's Brief Sexual Fling with James
Intense "Thrust It" Rehearsals Led by Marty
(Patrick Bristow)
Meal Conversation at Spago's: "I like nice tits"
"I like having nice tits"
Cristal - Furious and Jealous that Zack Slept with Nomi
Vengeful Nomi Admitting to Being Behind Cristal When She Fell Down a
Flight of Stairs and Broke Her Hip - But Cleared of Blame
The New Headliner For the Stardust Show - Miss Nomi Malone
At the Debut Performance After-Party - Andrew Carver
Molly's Gang-Rape Incident
Zack's Discovery of Nomi's Past Life
|