Round Table: Showgirls

As recently as December, 2002, the New York Times' Elvis Mitchell referred to the "wreckage"of Showgirls (1995). Yet the Film Quarterly editorial board had just been galvanized by a discussion of the same film. Apparently there exists a number of secret and not-so-secret devotees of the film. Showgirls has, perhaps unexpectedly, served to stimulate scholarly thought around issues of camp, satire, class, gender, the fallen woman, showgirl musicals, trash cinema,sexploitation films, hedonistic criticism, and reading and teaching the film. Noël Burch, Akira Mizuta Lippit, Chon Noriega, Ara Osterweil, Eric Schaefer, Jeffrey Sconce, and Linda Williams have contributed to this discussion of the film. Perhaps Showgirls can still be rescued from the wreckage?