RATING: 1/10
"Nothing more than a high budget masturbation fantasy"
SHOWGIRLS (NC-17) - Contains graphic nudity, profanity, sexual situations and violence. Some people, however, keep their clothes on.
You do not watch porn films for their intellectual values, nor do you write reviews on them. That's why this review will be short. It seems that this film will end up in the porn section when it hits the video stores. There is no story, script, point or acting. Only naked bodies, which is exactly the point.
Here is the so called plot: Nomi, the 23-year-old with a dark past as a hooker, has hitchhiked from somewhere back east to perform in a show where a dancer doesn't wear much more than a light coating of powder and a big, fake smile. No one is twisting Nomi's arm. No one is holding her grandmother hostage. She wants to do this. And that is what she is doing till the end credits. So what's the problem then? What's the point? What's the film about? Is there anyone whose aspirations could inspire less sympathy? This film can be described in one sentence: Obscene level of incompetence, excessive stupidity in the story line, gross negligence of the viewer's intelligence, a prurient interest in the quick buck. Believe me, after an hour with these characters, acting and script, you'll start hoping for someone to kill somebody.
Elizabeth Berkley makes a laughable try as the heroine of this film, that is bad even for Eszterhas' script. Her character is the only one that is at least half written and she could really have done better. Her character denies the fact that she is a whore for the industry, selling her body to the hungry eyes of the horny public. "I am not a whore! I am a dancer", she screams, but does it in such an over dramatized way that you'll start laughing. In fact the acting in "Showgirls" brings terrible to a new and previously unknown level. Not one single achievement, besides the conventional cinematography, is worth mentioning. It is a total waste of time and money. There is not a single moment of what you might call intelligence. The dialogue is structured of ancient stereotypes and cliches lined up one after another. Its attempt to even imagine to have half a brain results in a catastrophe. "In my films," writes director Paul Verhoeven ('Basic Instinct', 'Total Recall'), "I hold the mirror up to life." Well, excuse me? His attempt to go behind the scenes of Las Vegas, and as he put it "show the naked truth", is simplified and unreal. Occasionally, between his collection of mistakes and logical irrationalities, screenwriter Joe Eszterhas (the creator of some of the worst screenplays in Hollywood history) inserts some lines of deep morality, that sound something like this: "Hey, I see you. I see that you're hiding" - "From what?" - "From you". Yes, and even the only decent line in this film: "Nomi is what Las Vegas is all about" can't save 'Showgirls' from going under. It's a strange phenomena. It's not erotic, because it lacks sensuality. Not dramatic, because it lacks the acting. And not intelligent because it lacks a story. It is simply Verhoven's bad excuse for making pornography. You want to see naked women? Bare breasts? Full frontals? It's nothing wrong with that. But in that case I suggest that you rent a porn film in your local video store, and not waste time surviving through Eszterhas' pathetic dialogue. B qualities, while it's only a high budget porn-film.
VOTED AS WORST FILM OF 1995
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