It's hard to believe this actually exists. Maybe it's one of those projects which are better off in short hand having never been made or read eg "Eszterhas and Verhoeven were going to make Showgirls after Basic Instinct but they could never get the finance". That would've sounded awesome. This is not awesome.
It's not even awesome fun. Maybe it is watching it but... I don't know. It's a mess. It's about Nomi, a dancer who wants to make it in Vegas, and discovers it's all shallow.
Nomi yells and abuses people a lot - I mean a lot. Sure, sometimes she gets ripped off but she's really aggro. Elizabeth Berkley played the part as written. Why does she deserve fame? (as much fame as being a dancer in Vegas can get you anyway?) She doesn't seem to like dancing. She doesn't seem to like people. She doesn't seem to like Zack, that guy she sleeps with - so the fact he manipulated her doesn't mean much. She doesn't seem to particularly like her friend Molly, the one who gets raped - I mean she avenges her rape which is cool but she yells at her a lot and makes her go dancing.
I kept expecting the James subplot to reveal that she loved dancing but no - that plot went nowhere. He wanted to dance with her, she didn't want to, he slept with another dancer, used the same lines on both, but then told the truth to Nomi, then left. It was like "why did we watch that whole plot?"
I get the Cristal plot - it's All About Eve. Only in that film you had logical dramatic drive - Eve tried to take over Margot's life, by pinching her men and her roles and her life. There's none of that here - Cristal kind of manipulates Nomi, but basically gives her a job. Nomi gets an audition then Cristal stops it - that's not super evil.
There's horrible treatment of the dancers which I'm sure is true to life but isn't fun - Tony Moss abuses them, that horrible strip club guy Sal abuses them. Why bring back him and the chubby comic, Henrietta? They were awful.
Eszterhas might argue it was meant to be a comedy but it lacks logic and proper narrative drive. Really he should have had someone killing off the strippers and Nomi investigating. And Cristal and Nomi should have slept together.
But it's awful on the page.
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