TS: SHOWGIRLS vs. ROAD HOUSE

Roadhouse is awesome! Michelob... is not.

BULLROAR DAN!!! okay....I've converted many to the Michelob...when --- BE HONEST --- was the last time you had some brown bottle michelob????

1994. It was cheap and I wanted beer. I later decided that, for the price point, Meister Brau has better flavor per cent.

(Then again I really genuinely like overly-hoppy microbrews, usually the hoppier the better.)

Dude, Michelob has really come into it's own! : )

also, you must have been in heaven given how much SUMMIT flows around here.

That was also the period of time when I drank tons and tons of malt liquor by choice, even when I could afford more expensive booze.

Dan and his Mickey's Big Mouths, I'm telling ya.

Ever since Phil/unperson observed that Road House is as much of a fantasy film as The Lord of the Rings my appreciation for its inanities has grown stronger. But even I still can't answer the exact question I originally posed.

Watching RH for a nth time again right now. So good. Just coming up to the big love scene.

roadhouse is amazing i could watch it everyday

"You're too stupid to have a good time!"

"what if he calls my mother a whore"

"IS she?"

"I used to fuck men like you in prison"

But, more importantly, at the end when our hero jumps (nude?) into the lake he runs past someone sitting by the side of the lake. Who is that supposed to be?

CRISTAL
I like nice tits. I always have. How about you?

NOMI
I like having nice tits.

CRISTAL
How do you like having them?

"It must be weird, not having anybody cum on you"

pain don't hurt

pain don't hurt

-- latebloomer, Sunday, May 4, 2008 10:39 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Gina Gershon, yesterday (second from right):

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/05/05/theater/Boeing1650.jpg

Context.

i am watching road house right now

nobody ever wins a fight

patrick s has cancer :-((((((

^^ i know that's super sad :(

i saw him on the cover of people in the grocery store, i had no idea he was sick.

patrick swayze's going to die. you're going to die and i'm going to die. everyone's going to die.

BUT THESE TWO MOVIES WILL LIVE FOREVER

i can't stop thinking about showgirls, i actually think it is a great film, not "so bad it's good" at all. everything about it is great. the acting is fantastic, the casting is perfect, there's a million little details, a million little rhymes and "grace notes", the ending is ambiguous, berkeley's character is totally compromised yet winsome, and if you think about it the whole thing is a backstage story, the underside of the glitz, the division of labour that keeps the dream factory alive; it's about the workers. that creepy scene with gina gershon and her fingernails. the fantasy of re-invention. sex as everything - exhibition, leverage, status - everything except tenderness. i don't quite buy berkeley pulling the switch blade at the beginning though. you know who would have made a great nomi? leonardo dicaprio.

You are secretly Paul Verhoven.

i think i may be! this is a good interview with him, in which he says, "If you don’t exaggerate, then there’s nothing to life."

http://www.cinema-scope.com/cs30/int_koehler_verhoeven.html

"Showgirls" is pretty much full-on astonishing.

We're all long past the point of pretending that Showgirls is a bad movie. These are enlightened times.

Back up a bit, folks. Eszterhas is forever the stumbling block.

oh c'mon ned:
"I have a problem with pussy. I always have, and I'm always gonna."

the real problem is Berkley. She acts like she's in a bad movie. That and the wtf contrived scene where her friend gets beat up.

It was actually that wtf contrived scene that prompted my comment!

yeah as I recall it wasn't even necessary for the plot mechanics.

that scene kills off the camp fans - i'm glad it's there because of that; you don't get to just giggle at implications of forced blowjobs and coerced whoredom at the hands of millionaire boat show enthusiasts

i mean, you giggle, but the rape scene retroactively de-gigglefies you, which i think is pretty key

http://www.nerve.com/CS/blogs/screengrab/archive/2008/06/12/girl-disempowering-nine-films-that-didn-t-do-feminism-any-favors-part-two.aspx

“Do you know what they call that useless piece of skin around a twat? A woman!” And that hilarious quip from strip club “comedienne” Henrietta “Mama” Bazoom pretty much sums up the philosophy towards women in this abortion of a cult classic by screenwriter Joe Eszterhas and director Paul Verhoeven. Sure, I get it...this campy, overwrought drag show bitch-fest about amoral sex worker Nomi Malone (Elizabeth Berkley) is so bad it’s good! And we can all just laugh through the parts where Gina Ravera’s Molly (the only vaguely redeemable or recognizably human character in the movie, and a black woman to boot) gets brutally raped by a loathsome white rock star. (I love it when they act out that part in the drag queen version of the show at my favorite hipster bar!) Garish, ridiculous and aggressively stupid, Showgirls is hard for me to enjoy ironically, since it so clearly embraces and truly believes in its own fetid realpolitik Hollywood philosophy that love is a lie, “art” is whatever makes money, winning is everything, men are scumbags, women are worthless (especially if they’re not hot, naked and young), the world is a shithole, if you’re not clawing your way to the top every single minute (and/or don’t know how to properly pronounce the most expensive status symbol brand names) you’re a fool and a loser and deserve what you get. Yeccch. Showgirls ain't just misogynistic: it pretty much hates everyone. And the feeling is mutual.

Contributors to this article, btw, are "Andrew Osborne, Phil Nugent, Leonard Pierce"

Roadhouse on again last night. When oh when oh when will it get the Criterion double dvd treatment it so richly deserves?

Hahah, I was thinking of reviving this thread today for some reason. Great Neds think alike.

It's always a good time to revive this thread.
It was up for 5 Razzies, including the totally bizarre Worst Supporting Actor for Gazzara which proves, if proof were needed, that they are a complete pile of do-do.

which proves, if proof were needed

Surely 'which proves, if proof be need be'

Road House 2 has my favorite JAKE Busey performance:

http://www.spoonyexperiment.com/rants/RoadHouse2/RoadHouse2-Busey3.jpg

no neon fiddle no cred

Last month at the AVClub, Scott Tobias considered one, then the other.

???

by Preparation Heche

Is there anyone here who thinks this is just an awful, stupid movie?

5:50 AM Thurs July 10, 2008

heheh, some people...

There's no justifying Road House as a good film, exactly, but it's so entertaining that it provokes philosophical musings about how "good" even applies sometimes

Erm, so it is a good film then?

av club goes way too far in rationalizing reasons to like these flicks.

This is actually interesting:

It's a shame that Verhoeven wasn't allowed to explain himself on the DVD, since he gives bar-none the best commentaries in the business

I can't say I've heard any of his commentaries, so is this claim accurate?

well i guess I'M going to be up until 4:05 a.m. est.

thanks, hbo.

Still haven't seen Showgirls, totally love Road House obv.

really need to sit and watch it. i've only seen the edited-for-tv version.

Showgoilz that is