So bad it’s good

CINEMARENO usually aims to bring quality underground or foreign films to Reno that normally wouldn’t play in local theaters. But this month, the film society has decided to pay homage to one of the most critically panned movies in recent cinema history. No, it’s not Gigli or Glitter, but another movie that most film critics put on their worst-of lists—the 1995 flick, Showgirls. Seattle humorist David Schmader will demonstrate why he thinks the movie is so bad it’s good with a satirical, scene-by-scene analysis of the movie in a presentation called, “Showgirls—Revisited.” Starring Elizabeth Berkeley as a lap dancer with dreams of becoming a Las Vegas showgirl, Showgirls was critically savaged for its gratuitous helpings of nudity, sex, drugs and violence combined with bad dialogue and overacting. “It’s not like bad movies, where you lose interest after 20 minutes,” says Schmader. “Rather, it remains surprisingly awful at every turn. It is this unprecedented density of failure that makes Showgirls so sublime.” Schmader will present his “tribute to trash” 7 p.m. Oct. 24 in the Sierra Room at the Reno Hilton, 2500 E. Second St. Tickets are $10 and are sold at the door a half-hour before show time. Visit www.cinemareno.org for details.