SHOWGIRLS

[Dom D Spoon! Find all posts View Profile Close Dom D]

You know what this movies missing? James Woods. He could easily have played any of the male roles in this. Instead somehow we have all American boy Kyle MacLachlan looking as out of place as it's possible for an actor to look. It's like casting Bambi in a remake of Meet The Feebles.

I haven't seen this film since I was about 15 and when I was 15 I thought it was great. Not sure I ever saw it all the way through but it was still clearly quality cinema. Rewatching it with slightly wiser eyes now was not quite the same experience. What a fucking misfire. It must have seemed like a good idea at the time. "It's '42nd street' but with tits". 42nd Street was good. Tits are good. How can you go wrong?

Well casting Berkley for a start. She hasn't come on much as an actress since her Saved By The Bell days. More importantly she somehow manages to be a naked Hollywood leading lady, with a permanent "come on" attitude and still manage to be completely unsexy. She's all angles. No tits, no arse.

The real culprit here though is the Eszterhas script. Everybody here is so intensely unlikeable but not not in a fun way. More in a "I used to avoid dicks like you in high school sort of way". Somehow despite the surrounds and their back grounds they all come with middle class, middle brow values. Nomi walks in a guy she's maybe, sort of seeing with another girl and gets cut up about it. The showgirls I know would have to be married and have had a sit down talk about exclusivity before that would be a problem. It just doesn't feel real for a moment.

Veerhoven is not in fine form either. He was apparently fucking Berkley and any number of Showgirls and no doubt in the process he took his eye off the ball. So to speak. That pool sex scene with MacLachlan... what the fuck was he thinking? My girlfriend was in hysterics. "Ha, ha one of your favourite directors directed that! (fit of giggles) You listed him as an inspiration!"" Well yes. We all have bad days.

Didn't make it to the end. Must have dozed off. The last thing I remember is the black girl was about to be raped. Odd to fall asleep to a rape scene but it's a good indication of how soporific this film is. This has become known as a so bad it's good classic but I just couldn't get any fun out of it at all.

[Alex K. Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Alex K.]

Everybody got AIDS and shit!

[sukebanboy Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close sukebanboy]

Dom...the end is one of the best bits of the movie....See what Berkely does..i was on the floor in hysterics!!!

I LOVE this movie.....Everything about it is just....well....'off' is the best way to describe it....From the mis-castings to the dreadful script to the crap nudity to the aggressive strip dancing...... I think Verhoeven was seriously trying to f*k this one up from the start and add his own undercurrent throughout the movie.....

Don't see where the hate is coming from...this is what Verhoeven had in his mind all the way through filming....I personally feel he WANTED to make a film like this...and he succeeded....

[Dom D Spoon! Find all posts View Profile Close Dom D]

this is what Verhoeven had in his mind all the way through filming....I personally feel he WANTED to make a film like this...and he succeeded....

I'd love to know whether that's right. It's certainly possible. He's such a crazy bastard I could equally believe that he was completely unaware of what he was doing or that it was all planned from the start. Certainly Eszterhas had a different movie in mind calling it at the time, "a deeply religious experience". He named his lead character Nomi after the girl he was fucking around on his wife with at the time as a sign of affection. It was a dubious tribute to start with but he lists it now as one of his serious writing regrets that her name is forever tainted by that movie.

I feel like I should like this. But for every "I've got my period... check" moment there's ten minutes of boredom inbetween. There are a lot of tits in those ten minute slices of course but I've kind of lost interest in non sexualised nudity somehow.

From the mis-castings to the dreadful script to the crap nudity to the aggressive strip dancing

So the aggressive stripping is the invention of the movie? I've never seen that sort of thing on stage myself but then I've never been to America and I was putting it down to cultural differences.

[sukebanboy Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close sukebanboy]

So the aggressive stripping is the invention of the movie? I've never seen that sort of thing on stage myself but then I've never been to America and I was putting it down to cultural differences.

I've never been to America either......but I would be SCARED to go into a strip joint if the girls were as aggressive and un-sexy as Berkely seems to be channeling!!!...I remember it being more like an Olympic workout than the erotic dance it was supposed to be....

As ofr my other point, I am sure Verhoeven looked at the daily rushes as they were making this...I think he KNEW what he was doing all along..How could he watch even the "pool" scene and take it seriously...

I too would also love it if Verhoeven thought "right Eszterhaus you overpaid shit...i will mutate EVER part of this movie until you don't recognise it!"!!LOL!!

(I seriously doubt if Eszterhaus' original script was even CLOSE to a "religious experience"...but I don't doubt that Verhoeven (deliberately or not) morphed it into something else!!

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

So the aggressive stripping is the invention of the movie? I've never seen that sort of thing on stage myself but then I've never been to America and I was putting it down to cultural differences.

I haven't been to a nudie bar in a long time but when I used to go, would stay away from the clubs with the more aggressive girls. They're definitely out there, there are clubs that are just as goofy as what you see in the movie, but they were, in my experience years ago, the exception rather than the rule. Then again, my friends and I would go to the more mellow, smaller clubs - cheapear beer, better music. It was more about hanging out than interacting with strippers, really.

But I digress.

Showgirls cracks me up. Like Sukeban Boy says, everything about it is off and pretty much wrong. It is, in my eyes, a fabulous disaster. I haven't seen it in a few years so it's entirely possible my opinion may have changed, but the last time I watched it I loved it for all the wrong reasons.

Never did find Berkley all that attractive though.

[Lalala76 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lalala76]

So I recently got Showgirls unrated on Blu-ray. Its the Dutch filmworks release which is supposedly uncut. I did a compare with imdb and it seems to be the uncut edition (132 mins).

http://movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=1932233

I'm going to sound a little pervy here, but on my copy the infamous Kick by Berkley near the end seems to have been cropped so you don't see the naughty vag shot. I cant quite understand this. Does the US version show this?

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

If nobody beats me to it I'll dig out my disc and check for you tomorrow when the kid isn't around.

[Derrick King Waterfall Puncher Find all posts View Profile Close Derrick King]

It has been awhile since I last watched the Blu-ray, but I'm pretty sure it is cropped. The film was shot Super 35, to be seen at 2.35:1, so you only get the vagina shot on unmatted versions.

[Lalala76 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lalala76]

It has been awhile since I last watched the Blu-ray, but I'm pretty sure it is cropped. The film was shot Super 35, to be seen at 2.35:1, so you only get the vagina shot on unmatted versions.

Its a pretty notorious scene, albeit its a blink and you'll miss it, so it seems really odd to have an unrated version or NC-17 on Blu-ray and not have that scene. After all, most people own the film not because of its amazing narrative and acting lol but lets face it its because of Elizabeth Berkley in the buff. I must be of only a handful of people to actually like the film. I kind of feel a bit wary about whether there are other shots that are missing or cropped. I never owned it on vhs/dvd or bd before but I'm sure I saw this on tv last year in the Uk and it had that shot. Did the original dvd have it too?

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

Its a pretty notorious scene, albeit its a blink and you'll miss it, so it seems really odd to have an unrated version or NC-17 on Blu-ray and not have that scene. After all, most people own the film not because of its amazing narrative and acting lol but lets face it its because of Elizabeth Berkley in the buff. I must be of only a handful of people to actually like the film. I kind of feel a bit wary about whether there are other shots that are missing or cropped. I never owned it on vhs/dvd or bd before but I'm sure I saw this on tv last year in the Uk and it had that shot. Did the original dvd have it too?

Nope, it's not present on any of the DVDs, AFAIK - it's only visible on the tapes (and possibly 16:9 television transfers) which 'open up' the Super 35 framing.

EDIT. NSFW link ahoy: http://www.cathyplus.com/?p=4773

[Lalala76 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lalala76]

Wow, I feel cheated out of a Berkley muff shot lol

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

Wow, I feel cheated out of a Berkley muff shot lol

Check the link I posted above. Never feel cheated again

[sukebanboy Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close sukebanboy]

I used to have the laserdisc of this one...and it was definitely a FULL CROTCH SHOT KUNG FU KICK.....Was too busy laughing at it and thinking WTF to pay much attention....but I guess the laserdisc was correct ratio....

i am gonna watch this one again this weekend I think...See if I still enjoy it or not...

Esterhas' big mistake was believing his own hype.....He was perfectly adequate writing stuff like NOWHERE TO RUN for Van Damme...before he went up is own arse after BASIC INSTINCT...

[Lalala76 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lalala76]

Check the link I posted above. Never feel cheated again

Would have been much better to see it in glorious hd lol and the Blu-ray does look amazing. God I feel such a perve. I still find it extremely odd that someone thought that it would be ok not to have that shot. Its weird, I own lots of h/c porn features, but there is something about just having a "naughty" glimpse sometimes in a mainstream that floats my boat a lot more.