SHOWGIRLS (1995)—Verhoeven does Vegas

Cinema of Cruelty (Movies for Masochists)

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Paul Verhoeven’s 'Showgirls' (1995). Pitched as an epic MGM (no music) musical set in the seedy shadow of the Vegas Strip; boasting a screenplay about the cutthroat hierarchy of topless showgirls vs. strippers as written by the highest paid screenwriter in Hollywood history; and captained by a director with a unique aptitude for satire through brutal excess, Showgirls is a film that people in 1995 just didn’t know what to do with. Subsequent home video viewers and midnight screenings embraced the film as a cult staple of the “so bad its good” variety, but recent audiences have begun to take Showgirls seriously, reconsidering it as a movie that might actually just be *good*. London and Benji explore in excruciatingly exuberant detail why this later camp is, in fact, right.

Episode Safeword: “caffeine”