In 1995, Dutch director Paul Verhoeven released what he considered to be his “MGM musical” – Showgirls was the over-the-top tale of Nomi Mallone (Elizabeth Berkley) and her rise to the top of the Vegas exotic dancing world. It was an extraordinary critical and financial failure, grossing only about $20 million at the box office (less than half of its production budget) and earning critical scorn for nearly everyone involved in the creation of the film. While director Paul Verhoeven went on to continue working in Hollywood (his 1997 film Starship Troopers was financially and critically successful), writer Joe Eszterhas hasn’t been involved in a box office success since Showgirls and star Elizabeth Berkley’s career was nearly ended.

Showgirls has, over the past nine years, evolved into something of a cult hit, leading to its re-release on DVD this summer, in its original NC-17 rated form. Video rentals and sales have led the film out of box office failure and into profitable territory for MGM and United Artists. Midnight showings have sprung up in cities across the U.S., a la Rocky Horror Picture Show, and an “interactive screening” style road show hosted by David Schmader (whose commentary track on the DVD may be the one genuinely entertaining and rewatchable aspect of the V.I.P. release) has lent a certain air of respectability to a project that once seemed doomed to be known as the nadir of Verhoeven’s career.

Critical attention is once again being paid to Showgirls, and rightly so. The film is shocking, stupefying, and hilarious by turns. The bizarre duality of watching Berkley’s performance as Nomi is one of the most fascinating aspects of the film; one cannot help but be aware of watching a former child television star while Nomi’s “dancing” and emotional outbursts drive the film. Nomi is, in many ways, inseparable from Berkley – Nomi is far from a fully developed character, and Berkley has a way of destroying all suspension of disbelief. Yet you can’t quite take your eyes off of her. In the film, Nomi somehow manages to charm and draw in everyone around her in the film, and, strangely enough, the same can be said of the audience -- she manages to draw you in. It’s difficult not to feel a certain affection for Berkley (and for Nomi) while watching Showgirls, as they both throw themselves into their respective jobs with a totality that would be admirable if it weren’t so comically robotic. (As Schmader says on his commentary track, “She has two emotions: staring, and kicking.”)

Showgirls is clearly an homage to MGM musicals in a few limited respects. It is loud, flashy, and over-the-top. The characters will take any excuse as an opportunity to dance, and most of what passes for emotional exchange in the film is conveyed through dancing (or, alternately, sex as dancing). Many critics have discussed what appears to be a lack of satirical intent on Verhoeven’s part, but the topic of the film’s satire is in fact America’s excess and obsession with money, sex, and empty flashiness as Verhoeven sees it through the lens of Las Vegas, perhaps the flashiest and most excessive city in America. That Verhoeven presents Nomi and her world to the audience without so much as a wink speaks volumes to his ability as a satirist. The film is capable of being shocking in what appears, at first, to be outright misogyny until you realize that it’s not just the women a who are robotically driven by sex and ambition, but the men as well. Can it be sexism if not a single character in the film is sympathetic? If everyone is equally awful?

The crucial exception to this rule of unsympathetic characters is Nomi’s roommate Molly, who is harshly and inexplicably punished for her goodness by being violently raped on camera. The film purports to avenge her by having Nomi find Molly’s rapist and brutally beat him, but this solution rings hollow and begs the question as to why these sequences were ever included. That the one character in the film who “loses” is a working-class African-American female is either a biting commentary on American society, or a glaring and distressing commentary on the abilities of Verhoeven and Eszterhas. (For the record, Nomi states that she “won” in Vegas. When asked what she won, she replies, “Me.”)

Visually, the film does its best to embody Verhoeven’s vision of Las Vegas as a city that thrives on the conflict between its surface glitz and the barren back alleys and deserts that lie underneath. The dance numbers are lush, exotic, and flush with glitter and sparkle; Verhoeven has stated that he felt the need to outdo Las Vegas in his film version, and it is quite possible that he succeeded in producing an image even more garish and visually loud than his source material. However, the image quality on the new DVD transfer is stunning and speaks well for Verhoeven’s visual talents. The film is full of light and color, shot composition is excellent, and this is one facet of the film that gives the viewer insight into Verhoeven’s subtext. By shooting the film in such a straightforward and unforgiving manner, by carefully framing the terrible performances and giving visual space and luster to complement the plodding and robotic dialogue, Verhoeven exposes his characters for who they truly are. Their motivations are stripped bare, their lines are all clunkers, and Verhoeven’s satire reveals itself hidden under the layers of shoddy acting and poor writing.

The film garnered its NC-17 rating for, “ nudity and erotic sexuality throughout, and for some graphic language and sexual violence.” It is hard to imagine how anyone might cut the film down to an R rating, let alone cut it for cable broadcast. (VH1 aired a severely cut version of Showgirls with many dubbed-over lines, and computer animated bikinis to hide the excessive nudity throughout the film.) It is fitting that, as Showgirls rises again, this time into the realm of the cult classic, it has been restored to its original theatrical cut. Echoing exploitation films of a former era in American cinema, Showgirls is a bad camp film of the highest order, and one of its most fascinating aspects is that the film is so straightforward that it lends itself to be read on multiple levels. For those seeking camp fun, bad dialogue, and goofy acting, this newly restored version of Showgirls is sure to fit the bill (particularly if one views the film with David Schmader’s commentary track turned on). For audiences looking for more satire and social commentary from Paul Verhoeven, Showgirls presents itself as a kind of riddle -- sifting through the layers in search of the subtext is just a different kind of fun.