Some years ago, because I was bored and there was nothing else in the video store, I rented “Showgirls.” (My God, I just realized Roger Ebert gave it two stars. TWO stars. Must have gotten all those twinned aereolae on his brain, poor boy.)
Anyway, I rented “Showgirls.” Never have I been so regretful that it was just Alan and me in the room that night. Not that Alan isn’t fun to bounce wisecracks off of, but that’s a movie that requires a houseful of company, well-seeded with the wisecrackiest gay men you know. My friend Ron, with whom I once had a series of bad-movie dates, would have peed his pants over it. At every turn in the story, when the question is: Low road? Or lower road? “Showgirls” just takes a flat-out dive for the one below that, and it is just a hoot. When Elizabeth Berkley licks the pole! Ahhhhhh!
Now Jon Carroll has finally gotten around to seeing it, and I’m pleased to say he adds significantly to the “Showgirls” canon. Describing a …well, I guess you’d call it a “love” scene:
Kyle has this very large house out in the desert, and behind the very large house is a very large swimming pool, and after a night of flirtation, Kyle and Elizabeth find themselves making the showgirl with two backs in the shallow end.
Elizabeth is facing the stars with her head in the little trough where the excess water is collected. She is really, truly in ecstasy this time and not just pretending, and so she rolls her head back and forth, back and forth, faster and faster, looking something like a berserk piece of industrial machinery and something like a horse dying.
And this goes on. And on. And on. It goes on beyond all reason; you could go get popcorn at the beginning of the scene and still get back in time for the final 45 thrashes.
So who wants to have a “Showgirls” party? Invite me!
Linda said on August 3, 2004 at 6:31 pm
I love “Showgirls” for all the same reasons you listed. It’s like “Desperado”: It’s so incredibly bad it’s good. Every time “Showgirls” or Desperado” is on, I HAVE to watch.
My fave part is when someone is grilling Nomi about where she is from and Elizabeth Berkeley jerks the straw in and out of the cup, and in the worst acting job in the history of man, says something like “I don’t KNOW!! Placessssssssssss!” It’s a scream.
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deb said on August 4, 2004 at 11:53 am
we should start a bad-movie club. that would be much more fun than a book club. although a BAD-book club would be amusing. i just finished dan brown’s “angels and demons,” which was entertaining enough — it certainly piqued my interest about what kind of weird-ass religious artifacts the swiss guard protects at the vatican — but there were turns of phrase that made me want to scream. “verdant eyes,” for instance. i mean.
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john said on July 4, 2005 at 4:15 pm
yall need to put showgirls on tv more often.i am not the only one who thinks so.many others have expressed their feelings. we want to see showgirls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!oh do yall think yall could put it on tmcw or tmcxw thank you.
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