Gia Coppola
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Filmography
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Connections, in both directions
Similar to Demi Moore in The Substance, The Last Showgirl is another case of casting a ‘90s sex symbol that the system pushed aside acting in a project that calls it out for its ageist norms.
In its excoriation of the utter unfairness of how women in their fifties are treated by society, The Last Showgirl would seem to be a perfect double-bill partner The Substance…
In its excoriation of the unfairness of how women in their 50s are treated by society, The Last Showgirl would make a perfect double bill partner to The Substance…
Like the naturalistic flipside to this year’s The Substance, The Last Showgirl follows a woman in late middle age who is cast out of her glamour profession for the crime of aging; even more acutely than The Substance’s Demi Moore, Anderson, the wet-dream fantasy of the pneumatic ’90s, is a walking ledger of sexual currency.
It’s hard not to draw comparisons to Demi Moore’s performance in The Substance, as both films overlap in themes this year.
From The Substance to Maria to The Last Showgirl.
The Last Showgirl is a thoughtful and deft character study which charts similar terrain to Aronofsky's 2008's The Wrestler.
However, it inevitably draws comparisons to “The Wrestler,”…
…it doesn’t have the bruised brilliance of The Wrestler, for example…
The analog to The Last Showgirl and this Anderson performance is Mickey Rourke’s career-redefining performance in The Wrestler, which similarly encouraged the viewer to grapple (no pun intended) with an actor’s offscreen baggage and tabloid infamy, serving as an emotional shorthand for the character.
It’s reminiscent of Mickey Rourke’s turn in The Wrestler (2010), in stripping back a larger-than-life performer to its essence.
…while also existing in the same universe as The Iron Claw and The Wrestler…
The Virgin Suicides (2000)
Directed by Sofia Coppola
influenced Palo Alto (2014), The Last Showgirl (2024)
Themes Visuals
But the new film — written by Kate Gersten, a Coppola clan member by marriage — can’t compare to the piercing emotional intimacy of, say, The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation or Priscilla, even if the raw character study at its center steadily builds poignancy.
Alto plows no ground that hasn't been covered in films such as Kids, Thirteen and even The Virgin Suicides by Gia's aunt, Sofia Coppola.
(In fact, the film owes a heavy debt to auntie Sofia’s debut, “The Virgin Suicides,” a giant poster for which hangs in the Emma Roberts character’s bedroom.)
April’s room is adorned with a poster for The Virgin Suicides while the judge that offers Teddy a chance at redemption is provided in a cameo voiceover by the patriarch himself, Francis Ford Coppola.
It feels closer to a project from Coppola’s aunt (“The Virgin Suicides”) or maybe Gus Van Sant (“Paranoid Park”).
In addition, there are movie posters featured in the film for One from the Heart and The Virgin Suicides.
KRISTIAN: “Palo Alto” might be “Kids” for a new geenration…it’s not as shocking or as bold as that groundbreaking film, but it’s still a very real depiction of high school life and all the trials, tribulations and temptations that accompany that time.
A film like “Kids” serves as a shocking wake-up call to absentee parents, while “Elephant” and “Paranoid Park” exist to show how this lack of supervision has gone too far, leading to death (from the last year alone, add pics such as “What Richard Did” and “ Les Apaches ” to that list, all triggered by acts of teenage murder).
The movie often recalls Larry Clark's early work (Kids, Bully) in its effortless authenticity, though in contrast to his emotional brutality, the tone here is gentle and understanding.
Borrowing liberally from the likes of "Kids" and "Elephant," first-time feature director Gia Coppola's "Palo Alto" is a largely familiar portrait of teen angst, but it's also a fairly accomplished one.
As it might sound, it's all pretty familiar stuff, indistinguishable on the page from a dozen other teen movies—it's "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" (a movie which gets a shout-out via a clip of Phoebe Cates' most immortal moment) by way of the airline edit of Larry Clark's "Kids."
The movie often recalls Larry Clark's early work (Kids, Bully) in its effortless authenticity, though in contrast to his emotional brutality, the tone here is gentle and understanding.
Palo Alto falls in the same moody and contemplative cinematic matrix that includes movies like Gus Van Sant’s Elephant, Larry Clark’s Bully, and Sofia Coppola’s The Virgin Suicides.
…the kind of show where rhinestones and crystal beads are supposed to signify class, like the “Goddess” revue in Verhoeven’s Showgirls.
But where a fun trainwreck like the campy Showgirls at least provides a comic backdrop against what these shows probably aren’t like, The Last Showgirl bathes in unearned melancholy…
This before it devolved into the type of cheap and tawdry place that attracts the likes of Nomi Malone in Showgirls.
Whatever shade you want to throw at Showgirls, Paul Verhoeven knew that nothing explores a dancer character better than seeing them dance.
“The Last Showgirl” isn’t a disaster, like “Showgirls,” sort of its reverse, was.
…a soulful, sensitive alternative to gaudy screen depictions of similar milieus, like Showgirls and Burlesque…
A film like “Kids” serves as a shocking wake-up call to absentee parents, while “Elephant” and “Paranoid Park” exist to show how this lack of supervision has gone too far, leading to death (from the last year alone, add pics such as “What Richard Did” and “ Les Apaches ” to that list, all triggered by acts of teenage murder).
Palo Alto falls in the same moody and contemplative cinematic matrix that includes movies like Gus Van Sant’s Elephant, Larry Clark’s Bully, and Sofia Coppola’s The Virgin Suicides.
Director Van Sant, for all his excesses in movies like Paranoid Park and Elephant, usually makes his adolescents and their anxieties seem real.
The Last Showgirl does something similar to Anora (2024), which is to humanise the figures on stage.
…neither does this titillation-adjacent tale fall into the traps of passive, patronizing attitudes that befell the heavily feted Anora.
It’s almost impossible not to draw comparisons to Sean Baker’s Anora in this regard.
Like Imitation of Life, The Last Showgirl treats high-gloss femininity as a form of false consciousness, an ideal imposed upon women that ends up alienating them from each other, particularly mothers from their daughters.
“The Florida Project,”…
…channelling elements of his films’ gritty, sun-drenched realism, even sporting a similar colour palette to The Florida Project…
…there is more than a touch of Coppola’s aunt Sophia’s Priscilla…
…can’t compare to the piercing emotional intimacy of, say, The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation or Priscilla…
…the affecting and comprehensive Pam (which itself felt like a tonic to the ill-advised, sensationalist miniseries Pam & Tommy)…
Hulu’s miniseries Pam & Tommy helped with this, as it was made not only without her blessing but against her protests.
Pamela Anderson might have been publicly opposed to the making of Pam & Tommy, Hulu’s glossy retelling of the theft of a private videotape from her home…
Hot on the heels of Hulu’s drama, Pam & Tommy…
After 2022's Pam & Tommy reappraised Pamela Anderson as a sympathetic hero…
No – let us not forget Orson Welles pumping out “Citizen Kane” at 24 – but it is fresh and has a bite that feels different even while treading in the same pool as other fine female coming-of-age efforts in the recent past – ”Palo Alto” (2013) and the more accomplished “Diary of a Teenage Girl.”
But the new film — written by Kate Gersten, a Coppola clan member by marriage — can’t compare to the piercing emotional intimacy of, say, The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation or Priscilla, even if the raw character study at its center steadily builds poignancy.
…while The Red Shoes is all about a woman put to the test when it comes to choosing between her art (also ballet) or romantic love. The latter is especially resonant to Shelly, who has always chosen her art form over relationships…
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)
Directed by Robert Aldrich
influenced The Last Showgirl (2024)
Themes
Historians can point to the brief spate of mature actress thrillers from the early 1960s (WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE and its ilk) as an inspiration for that film.
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976)
Directed by John Cassavetes
influenced The Last Showgirl (2024)
Themes
…at its best The Last Showgirl recalls John Cassavetes’ The Killing Of A Chinese Bookie, with Anderson channeling the forlorn spirit of that film’s Ben Gazzara…
Not since Leaving Las Vegas has Las Vegas looked so much like somewhere worth leaving…
…die-hard fans of Barb Wire or those looking for a warm, fuzzy and easily digestible tale of redemption will be disappointed.
…certainly not her much ballyhooed blockbuster disaster Barb Wire…
From breaking through as a buxom lifeguard on “Baywatch,” she was mocked for failing to become a box office superstar with “Barb Wire.”
Pamela Anderson (Barb Wire) more than proves herself in her performance.
Though I probably saw “Barb Wire” (1996), I’m unfamiliar with Anderson’s work.
Clearly we are far from the beaches of Baywatch and action spectacle that was Barb Wire.
The atmosphere in “The Last Showgirl” and “Support The Girls” (2018) is similar though they are shot in different locations.