Live Nude Girls (1995)

This movie is like a precursor to the HBO series "Sex and the City", except it's less cutesy, less melodramatic and not at all obsessed with puns. If you'd like to see what Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte looked and sounded like about a step earlier on the evolutionary scale, you'll find it in Live Nude Girls.Less a story and more an extended monologue on women, sex and relationships that's been split between 6 different characters, this film is about the night some old friends have a bachelorette party sleepover. I don't know if a group of women all pushing up against 40 getting together for a slumber party was considered normal in Los Angeles in 1995 but it's the nail this story is hung on, so you've just got to go with it. Georgina (Lora Zane) is a confused bisexual who's thinking of switching back to men. Jill (Dana Delaney) is the raunchy one with the happy marriage that's never really talked about. Rachel (Laila Robins) is Jill's uptight sister who's staring down spinsterhood. Marcy (Cynthia Stevenson) is the awkward one who ends up banging her house painter, who then starts stalking her. Jaime (Kim Cattral) is the neurotic B-movie actress who's freaking out about her impending third wedding. Chris (Olivia D'Abo) is Georgina's current girlfriend and one of the least convincing lesbians in cinema history. A cross-dressing Benny Hill would have been more believable.The entire film is essentially these 6 women sitting around and talking about sex, with occasional cutaways for flashbacks and fantasies, with undercurrents of Georgina's sexual indecision, Jill and Rachel sniping at each other, Jaime's overwrought case of cold feet and a couple of secrets that, of course, end up blurted out before the night is over. There's also a decent amount of female nudity, an embarrassingly bad gay stereotype and a weirdly sympathetic view of men for this sort of film. Nothing in this story ever gets resolved or figured out or fixed. The movie just starts and these women yap away until it's over.If you want to watch women yapping about sex and relationships, you'll probably enjoy Live Nude Girls. If watching "Sex and the City" feels like someone is trying to suck your brain out through your nose, you probably won't like this movie. There's nothing wrong or bad about it, but it's entirely one of those things you either really like or you really don't. You're going to have to make that call yourself.

I don't have much to say about the film, but I guess that's mainly because I was too engaged throughout most of it to really think about it aesthetically. I always feel that good acting, writing and characters are the three most essential elements to a good film. "Live Nude Girls" has all three of those elements. I'm usually not hesitant to watch "chick flicks." I'm not saying this so that women reading this comment won't want to slap me in the face. I'm just a film buff in general, and I don't have much of a bias when I watch films. A good movie is a good movie. But during the first 20 minutes or so, even I was thinking, Hmmmm...this might be too much of a chick flick for me. Let's face it, there are certain things that women find amusing that men don't. If some woman made a joke involving a white sale at Bloomingdale's, I probably won't get it. But as the film progressed, I almost fell in love with these characters, and found certain elements that relate to my own situations with my friends. I did find it funny how the writer/director had the female characters talking candidly about sex and getting drunk, while the male characters were just playing pool and engaging in innocent, mundane conversations. I doubt a group of men would really throw such a dull bachelor party with no strippers, but it was funny nonetheless. And like with the show "Sex and the City" this film shows that men are not the only ones who can talk on and on about sex. True, we talk and think about it more, but that doesn't mean women don't talk about it at all. Being a heterosexual man, I can't help but admit that I found the copious female nudity and sex scenes between two women pretty damn stimulating. And I've had the hots for Dana Delaney ever since I saw her in "Exit to Eden." The film has plenty of funny moments, though there are some broad jokes that seemed a little out of place. Man or woman, you should check this film out. You'll probably be pleasantly surprised.

The tragedy is that some people -- men *and* women -- will watch a movie like this and think that it reflects the truth -- "how women really feel", etc. It's utter baloney, and the fact that a woman wrote this garbage is testament to one woman's willingness to write anything in order the appeal to the lowest common denominator and make a buck. Same goes for the performers involved.This flick was apparently a precursor to prettily-packaged toxic waste like "Sex in the City" -- and the tragedy is that, watching material like this, gullible men end up thinking that women enjoy degrading, unpleasant sex acts, and women, God help us, end up thinking they are *supposed* to enjoy them. Saddest of all are the little girls who see this stuff on TV and have developed no defenses against it.

As pointed out in other reviews, the veracity of the title leavessomething to be desired. I humbly suggest my one line summaryabove as a more truthful substitute.Having panned the title, what about the film? ..nothing worth paying theatre admission prices to see, but it will still cost you 95 minutesof your life, even if you see it "free."And why would you want to do that? Maybe if you are curious abouttechniques of character diminution that women can employ oneach other, you could find examples here. (BTW, note that I didn'tsay ALL women do this.)Then there is Dana Delany, who plays Jill, the strong one for thebetter part of the movie. You may wind up hating her as her truecharacter in this role is revealed, but she is good at what shedoes. In her other film works she brought life to "Exit to Eden" in areally silly role as the "queen" of an island where people go to playout their sexual fantasies. She plays a beautiful, but "dirtydouble-crossing woman" in "The Right Temptation" in which shecons Rebecca DeMornay into seducing her husband.Most of the problems with this movie center around the annoyingoveracting, exaggerated gestures, and excessive foul language. You may get the feeling that you're watching an episode of an"R-rated" soap focusing on an all-girls club meeting. But, what theheck, if you like that sort of thing, why not?