The Perks of Being a Vegas Showgirl | The Last Showgirl (2024) Movie Review
Pam Anderson shines in this contemplative, bleak, feminist film 🧚♀️
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As I wrote in my Nosferatu review, I was very ready to criticize or dislike Lily-Rose Depp’s performance in the film, based solely on her last name and assumptions I made regarding nepotism and how she got the job, etc.
So believe me when I say to you, when I read that The Last Showgirl was a film by Gia Coppola (to answer the question you’re probably asking, yes, she’s Francis Ford Coppola’s granddaughter, no, she’s not Sofia Coppola’s daughter… niece, I think, but I don’t care), I think my approximate reaction was, “oh, here we go…” but I was late sitting down in my seat, so I had very little time to work myself up into a lather about nepotism, and the film grabbed me pretty quickly.
I did not realize that the lead role — Shelly Gardner, a longtime Vegas showgirl who is in many ways an analogue for the woman who portrays her — was Pamela Anderson until fully 10 or 12 minutes in.
Obviously, I’ve seen her in Borat, and I watched Baywatch in glimpses here and there throughout my hyper-religious, cloistered upbringing. I think now I can vaguely recall some industry rumblings when Coppola cast Anderson in this, but I’d forgotten completely and watched her onscreen for nearly a quarter of an hour before I twigged.
I imagine that a lot of discussion about this film — to the extent there will be any, and I do hope there is — will revolve around how well Anderson did or did not do as an actor, and that’s a totally fair question, because she is onscreen nearly every minute of this film, and it relies on her heavily.
So let me outline what I believe an actor’s job to be, and please take into account that I have acted for precisely three directors: myself, once, and two college buddies in the University of Houston Honors College Club Theatre program, so I am nearly the furthest thing from an expert there is.
I think that what a director needs of an actor is for them to inhabit the inner life and world of their character, to the point that they can — with a sense of authenticity and truthfulness — portray that character when filmed, giving a performance that resonates with audiences as honest and real. There’s both work that takes place off-camera (I’m pronouncing it like Jenna Maroney in 30 Rock, if you’re wondering), and work that takes place on set in front of the camera.
Furthermore, since we — as dumb, lay assholes, and that definitely includes critics — aren’t there on set, we could never judge the quality of the work, only the quality of the performance, which is a blend of direction, acting, chemistry, cinematography… the whole shebang.
To wit, I believe Aaron Taylor-Johnson turned in one of the worst performances I’ve ever seen in an otherwise pretty-good movie in Nosferatu, but I have no idea if that’s because he was acting under duress, hated the director, was suffering some personal trauma or tragedy I’ll never know about, etc. so I would never say the man can’t act or is a bad actor (his performance in Kraven the Hunter was also the worst in that film, so it is starting to become a trend), but I think it’s totally fair to judge the performance that was given.
So let’s judge Pamela Anderson’s performance, shall we?
I loved it.
Hear me out — there are imperfections in the performance. I believe that I can tell just from what I’m seeing onscreen that she’s a little shaky, but because that’s also a fundamental, central aspect of her character, it could be acting, or a choice.
I don’t care. I could have gotten lost in the judgment and criticism, and picked apart her performance (or anyone’s), but when I stepped back for a second, and looked at the film holistically, Anderson did a truly phenomenal job.
I think that performing to one’s self in a mirror is one of the hardest jobs in acting. I don’t think many actors working today could carry off what — for my money — Anderson successfully did, which is making the acting-to-mirror scenes work.
She dances. It works. She sings. It works. She squeaks, she screams, she weeps.
It all works.
I’ve never seen Showgirls (I keep meaning to; I generally love Paul Verhoeven, and even to this day, people talk about that movie all the time), but from what I’ve gathered, this seems like the total inverse of that film.
The nudity and frequent exhibitions of female bodies is so stark and matter-of-fact. If there’s any glamor to this life, it’s exclusively onstage, which we don’t actually see until the closing minutes of the film (spoiler alert? The idea of this film being spoil-able is hilarious), when any glitz or glamor has been beaten out of us by the bleak realities of the world’s sexual politics and the multifaceted, often-contradictory (Madonna/Whore, I think they call it) demands placed on women.
This is by no means a perfect film. Just as Anderson’s performance was uneven, at times, so was the cinematography. The fairly-distinctive, hyper-closeup handheld camera work, which early on served to underscore the turmoil and isolation of Anderson’s Gardner, started to grate and detract from the narrative impact around the halfway point of the film.
Anderson is also really funny, at times. She’s mostly heartbreaking, and she does that well, but she’s got some really funny lines, often delivered in self-defense after an enormous loss of status or a personal defeat, and she does that well, too.
The script is not subtle. That’s not inherently a flaw, and while this film’s themes are hard to miss, I personally didn’t feel like I was being preached to or lectured at. If nothing else, it’s pretty certain that no one is going to miss the message of this film.
This might be a controversial statement: I think Pamela Anderson is better in this role than anyone else that could have been cast. Any polish or flair a more seasoned performer could give the role would be eclipsed by how much pathos and innate exuberance would be lost.
Anderson brings something special to this role, and the film achieves what it does in large part thanks to her work.
There’s a rhythm and cadence to this film, and as it ramps up in intensity and tension, Anderson is more than game. She excels at fever pitch.
Ultimately, I think Anderson’s performance should net her award nominations. A win might be a tough ask (I won’t speculate whether she deserves it, because they’re all subjective, made-up whatevers), especially in a season that looks to be stacked with strong performances from other women, but she’s inarguably the MVP of this solid film, which absolutely would not work (or even be much of anything) without her.
