Striptease (1996)

What a beautiful movie!

Great Film overall

Best movie ever!

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

Given all the high priced stars appearing in this movie, I found it to be on the disappointing side. Of course, I was never a big Demi Moore fan, but she does a fair job in this standard flick. Burt Reynolds could have been a little better, too. Armando Assante had his usual very solid performance. Stephanie Schick appearing as Pandora Peaks provided a little eye candy. I did find many parts of the movie mildly amusing which helped pass the time.

It's hard to know how to take Striptease. Should you take it, as a comedy or drama. Here you get little of each. Getting over that very raunchy, commercial, and flamboyant Verhoeven effort, Showgirls the year before, the strip show circuit, is thrown back in our faces again, where what we have here, instead, is a story, only this movie is less captivating, or enticing. Fighting for custody of her daughter, against her white trash alcoholic ex, (Patrick in one of his best performances) our hot Demi, such eye candy in black lingerie, goes back to what she does best, stripping, so she can earn enough to get herself a good lawyer and have permanent custody of her angel. This only scratches the surface of the story, involving murder, of an overweight, drooling customer, who tries to help Demi out of her pickle, bringing the attention of a good natured cop (Assante very good, but wasted here). After all the body, practically landed on Assante's doorstep. Of course the scene stealer is Burt, as a crooked congressman, who really has a kinky side to him, sporting different disguises when he frequents strips clubs. But we all have our kinks. His performance can be seen as terrible, or terribly great if you can grasp that concept. It's sad he got a Stinker award, whatever as this character is the furtherest from Burt, we've ever seen, as he's not Burt. Demi does really work the stage well though, like a pro, and we almost see all of Demi. She's As an actress here, though, she's done better, Disclosure, solid evidence of that. We too have a hot stripper actress from Showgirls, as well as other hotties. We have a really cute and funny, chimpanzee, could be the same one from Monkey Trouble, for all I know. Unfortunately Striptease, is a film, that just have that spark, or take off. But if you like nudity and comedy, hey, you could very well like this. Oh, also, if you're an Annie Lennox fan too.

I can remember Striptease being sold to the public as the film where Demi Moore flashes her newly augmented cans, the A-list actress paid a whopping $12.5 million to play stripper Erin Grant, whose quest to gain custody of her little girl (played by Moore's real life daughter Rumer) lands her in deep water with a sleazy congressman (Burt Reynolds) and the shady businessmen who back him.If seeing a lot more of Moore is all you're after, then you'll be as happy as the proverbial pig, the muscular actress jiggling her jugs and bodybuilder's butt throughout, but anyone expecting anything remotely resembling a decent film will feel more than a little disappointed: the plot is as cheesy as hell, the characters are incredibly clichéd, and the comedy is embarrassingly bad.At least Moore made a tidy fortune out of this mess, but I imagine Burt Reynolds, Ving Rhames (as lovable bouncer Shad), Armand Assante (concerned cop Al Garcia) and Robert Patrick (Erin's low- life ex) made total idiots out of themselves for a lot less.

It was with some surprise a few months ago that I read a list of worst movies ever made and this one was mentioned. This was surprising for a couple of reasons: the first one being that I'd forgotten the film existed, the second being that I struggled to remember any details from it that would lead to me to feel strongly enough about it to say it was the worst movie I've seen.And so, for some reason, I opted to watch this again. As I suspected, it was a waste of my time that achieved nothing of any value and took the cumulative total of minutes this film took away from me that I will never ever get back to 234. I can only assume director Andrew Bergman met Satan at an abandoned fork of a road in the deep south for this one to bring in $113 million world wide.Striptease is not good, not at all. The performances are bizarre, the script is not funny or sexy and even the soundtrack just doesn't fit. Demi Moore seems to have got her money's worth on highly publicized breast implants and is in fine physical condition, but still somehow unwatchable. Having said that though, this is no trainwreck. The actors all know what they're doing. The scenes are all strung together in a coherent narrative. This may not be any good, but it isn't incompetent either, and that makes things even worse.At the end of the day, unless you have a Demi Moore fetish, you will remember nothing about this movie. You'll forget that Burt Reynolds or Robert Patrick are in it. You'll forget that Moore's character had a child. In time you will forget the film exists. It's simply not bad enough to be entertaining or memorable, or worthy of any thought, positive or negative. And that is the film's biggest crime. Ultimately, Striptease is a giant black hole of nothing.