Review of Striptease (1996) by Allan C — 19 Dec 2014

Writer/Director Andrew Bergman ("The In-Laws" and "The Freshman") would seem to be the right director to bring the offbeat humor of a Carl Hiaasen novel to the screen. However, the tone of the film wasn't quite right and it send up nowhere as good as Hiaasen's book.

Similar to Elmore Leonard books, which for years had failed film adaptations until "Jackie Brown" and "Out of Sight," Hiaasen mixes humor and crime stories, often with a wide menagerie of colorful characters, in a way that's hard to translate to film.

In a story that mostly revolves around Demi Moore having to strip in order to make a living wage in order to get her daughter back from her crazed ex-husband who has custody. There are also plot threads involving the various characters at the Eager Beaver strip club, a cop (the underused Armand Assante), but the best is Burt Reynolds as the lecherous Senator Dilbeck.

Compared to "Jackie Brown" and "Out of Sight," those films weren't playing for laughs, whereas the actors in this film were. The other films let the situations create the twisted laughs, whereas this film had characters with silly haircuts and broad performances that made the film seem pretty lightweight.