Review of Showgirls (1995) by Clark B — 18 Oct 2010
An epic masterpiece of epical, masterpiecical proportions. It's two hours and eleven minutes of silver screen lightening captured in our jars. Elizabeth Berkley made her mark in cinematic history as the tragic spinning nubile young dancer fighting hopelessly for respect in an uncaring universe.
She dances, she flashes, she's a flashdancer. Screenwriter Joe Eszterhas deeply explores his trademark themes of dance and flash and the wages of sin. Berkley is figuratively (and for you sick perverts out there with no eye for metaphor, literally) naked here, a pawn in the capitalist system, manipulated by the corrupt industrial complex she is wretchedly unable to escape. She desperately slithers and spins crazily around poles, tongue akimbo, her circular fate laid bare, grinding and grinding, unable to cry out to the stern, hard male power structure (Kyle MacLachlan). Grinding, she grinds blindly. Finally, blindly grinding up, then down, then down and up, then up and down, her frenzied body convulses, a volcano erupts, her bosoms heave northward, her head thrashes, nipples erect from the existential exhaustion; the most heartbreaking scene in cinematic history. A single tear.
When she finally goes limp, she goes limp for us all. Such flaccid folly flaunts across the stage, signifying nothing. Out, out brief candle in the wind. Lava oozes over her dreams. Devastated, another lonely tear falls, crying. We taste it's salty sweetness before we put it in our jars. Thank you Miss Elizabeth Berkley, thank you Herr Eszterhas. THANK YOU! BRAVA! A true feminist manifesto. Show girls, indeed. Show us all. Five stars.
This review of Showgirls (1995) was written by Clark B on 18 Oct 2010.
Showgirls has generally received negative reviews.
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