Director: Gia Coppola
Starring: Pamela Anderson, Kiernan Shipka, Brenda Song, Billie Lourd, Dave Bautista, Jamie Lee Curtis
Certificate: 15
Run Time: 89 mins

The Last Showgirl is the new film by Gia Coppola, the granddaughter of Francis Ford Coppola and niece of Sofia Coppola. Pamela Anderson plays Shelly Gardner, a 57-year-old showgirl who has performed for nearly three decades in a classic French-style revue at a casino resort in Las Vegas. Eddie (Dave Bautista), the show’s producer, breaks the news that the show is due to close in two weeks due to declining ticket sales, which leaves Shelly downcast and worried for her livelihood. She’s viewed as a mother figure by some of her younger co-stars and Shelly maintains a close friendship with Annette (Jamie Lee Curtis), who also used to be part of the show but now works as a cocktail waitress. Shelly also has a semi-estranged daughter, Hannah (Billie Lourd), who she struggles to connect with because they’ve spent much of their lives apart. The film’s received some awards attention for its performances, with Pamela Anderson nominated for a Golden Globe and Jamie Lee Curtis for a BAFTA, but that didn’t materialise into an Oscar nomination for either star.

This is an odd film – The Last Showgirl has some interesting performances but its story doesn’t really amount to much. On the plus side, Pamela Anderson turns in an honest and authentic performance as the ageing showgirl and Dave Bautista is a standout as the show’s sweet-natured producer. It was also refreshing to see the charismatic Brenda Song, who hasn’t played in a high-profile role in a while and Jason Schwartzman shines in a brief cameo as an audition director.

But the film around the committed performances left me feeling pretty indifferent. Its direction feels like an awkward mix of Sofia Coppola and Sean Baker, especially the latter with its grainy cinematography. There’s next-to-no tension to Shelly’s existential crisis and once we get past sub-plots that go nowhere, the film begins to explore how women’s value in showbiz declines simply because of their age before it abruptly ends. It’s perhaps unfortunate that this film has released relatively close to The Substance, and while I’m no fan of that film either, at least it fully commits to unpacking the relationship between aging and stardom. In the end, The Last Showgirl just feels inconsequential with its unsatisfying narrative.