The Last Showgirl review - Pamela Anderson stars as a middle-aged Vegas dancer

Shelly (Pamela Anderson) is a dancer. She’s been with Le Razzle Dazzle, an outdated Las Vegas show that’s full of “breasts, rhinestones and joy”, in her words, for 30 years. And now it’s closing. Where can she go, at the age of 57?

The third feature film from director Gia Coppola (granddaughter of Francis Ford, niece of Sofia; Palo Alto, Mainstream) is an homage to those who struggle to make a living as Vegas show-girls and casino waitresses. The locations, with their desolate flyovers, freeways and neon glitz are atmospheric, but Kate Gersten's script doesn't light up the lives of these girls and women. They remain unexplored and unreal, in spite of impressive performances from co-dancers Kiernan Shipka and Brenda Song, with the fine Dave Bautista as Eddie, the gruff lighting guy.

And Pamela Anderson, acclaimed as Roxie in Bob Fosse’s Chicago on Broadway in 2022, is quite impressive as Shelly, but the part limits her to a wide-eyed, panicked vulnerability, whether sequin-eyelashed or with the no-make-up look she embraces now (pictured above). It doesn’t allow her to show any of the wild wackiness we see in Pamela, A Love Story, the 2023 documentary on Anderson, where she jokes, “My boobs had a career and I was just tagging along”. For Shelly, her topless dancing with Le Razzle Dazzle is deadly serious, in a one-dimensional way.

The white-lipsticked Annette (Jamie Lee Curtis, pictured below), Shelly’s best friend, left Le Razzle Dazzle six years ago to be a cocktail waitress – “I’m a very lucky person. It’s in me.” She takes herself less seriously than Shelly, says she likes being able to drink and gamble on her own time, but she has a bravado that can’t be sustained. Curtis is full of raddled verve, especially in a dance, mainly ignored by the casino punters, to Bonnie Tyler’s Total Eclipse of the Heart. We see the two friends twirling around and laughing against a blurry, rosy sunset, but it’s a clichéd image that doesn’t convey anything much. There's never a Boogie Nights moment that makes them come alive.

Shelly is devastated by the show’s demise. She loves the costumes, the sets, feeling beautiful, feeling seen. “That’s powerful and I can’t imagine my life without it.” Nice words, but said with a contrived fervour that’s finally rather dull and empty.

Cynical Jodie and Mary-Anne (Shipka and Song) who have to help the less limber Shelly do up her costumes, are young enough to move on to modern, sexier dance work, involving humping chairs gymnastically, anathema to old-school Shelly. They tell her that Le Razzle Dazzle is a dinosaur; no, she says, it’s Parisian, classy, evocative of another time. “Back in the 80s, American Express photographed us in all different sites. They shot me on the Great Wall of China. It was very special.” Sure, Shell, says Jodie. “Super special.” The grim reality is that she can’t retire. No pension, no medical benefits.

Another unpalatable reality is her needy, dysfunctional relationship with her semi-estranged daughter, Hannah (Billie Lourd), who was partly brought up by another family, though this isn’t explained in any detail. Shelly’s always leaving her desperate, guilt-ridden messages, and is overcome with gratitude when Hannah turns up unexpectedly. She’s a serious person, about go to college to study photography. How great to follow your dream and be part of a community, exclaims Shelly. “It’s pretty solitary,” says Hannah, in a revealing exchange that shows how out of touch - and how annoying - her mother is. “It’s not really a community.”

Hannah can’t forgive Shelly for “leaving me in a casino parking lot with a Game Boy while you did two shows a night.” What’s the point of this lame trash, she asks her mother cruelly, and why did you put it above me? “You’re in the goddamned back of 80 topless dancers.” But Shelly has no regrets, even when, in a brutal audition, a casting director (Jason Schwartzman) spells it out: “Your dance technique isn’t great. You were hired because you were beautiful, young and sexy a long time ago. It’s not what you’re selling any more, baby.” And you can’t help rooting for her when she spits back: “I’m beautiful and I’m 57, you son of a bitch.”

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