Risqué (2025)

Risqué (2025)

“In your life, you have never been as old as you are now. And you will never be as young again…”
And that’s the first line of the film! And it will come back several times… ad nauseam!

Sure, if you want to feast your eyes on pretty strippers, naked or scantily clad throughout the film, this movie might delight you, whether you’re a man who loves women or a woman who loves women. However, I’m not going to tell you whether this film debunks the prejudice against materialistic strippers. You’ll figure that out too quickly!

It was late. I wanted to watch a movie that wasn’t too long and didn’t make me think too much. That’s often a mistake! I didn’t put much effort into choosing and figured it would be bad or unlikely to be any good. However, once again, I loved the first half hour. After that, this film, classified as Action, Crime, Thriller, among others, gets worse and worse.

For once, they try to include as many current themes and terms as possible: Karma, chakras, golf, trees that have souls, etc. Two American women, a Hungarian woman (who everyone thinks is German), a Mexican woman, and a Japanese woman are brought together, and voilà, the trick is done!

Yes, just like in 355 (2022), we have five young women who, here too, all speak in their native languages at certain moments. Leah Gibson, the lead actress who shines in this role, has a twin sister named Erin, just in case. All of these actresses do a good job; it’s just that the movie is really bad.

In fact, we’ll also think back to other very bad films like Coyote Ugly (2000), which is more like a long MTV music video than a movie, and Blood Angels (2005), because no, when it comes to vampires and striptease, there’s nothing like From Dusk Till Dawn (1996). I won’t even mention those awful horror movies like Zombie Strippers, Strippers vs. Zombies, Strippers vs. Werewolves… and unfortunately, the list goes on! Even in crime thrillers, I’ve never understood why there are so many scenes set in these clubs. It’s as if detectives always have to go through this route to catch their targets. So… watching an entire movie that takes place in this kind of setting is not really my thing.

In fact, I’ve come to realize that there are no good striptease movies! Even Striptease (1996), for which Demi Moore gave her heart and soul, was a failure and terrible. Somebody’s Daughter, a 1992 erotic TV movie starring Nicolette Sheridan, wasn’t a total write-off, though.

According to IMDb: “Risque” is a dramatic and comedic crime film that follows a stripper who, after being fired from her club, organizes a high-stakes heist to take down a corrupt boss and the men who underestimate her. The film is described as a lighthearted crime comedy with heist elements, featuring a diverse cast that brings a fresh perspective to the genre. The film’s comedic tone and eccentric characters were well received, although some critics noted that the main villains weren’t sufficiently menacing. Overall, “Risque” is recommended for those who enjoy action crime films with a comedic twist and a deliberately light tone.

So, yes, it is partly a comedy! But violence is so commonplace in our times that it should be noted that there are some fairly brutal, gory scenes that are not at all suitable for the faint of heart. Striptease/robbery inevitably means drug trafficking, which means murders with quite a few bullets in the head. It’s dramatic and tragic, but too often, that’s how it is!

Personally, I felt like I saw a lot of actors who looked like other actors. There’s a guy who looks like Peter MacNicol, a girl who looks like Megan Fox, and another who looks like Judy Greer. But the fact is… I didn’t know anyone here! So maybe it was my brain desperately trying to cling to the familiar rather than sink into the unknown.

The staging is nice, but nothing very original or transcendent either. At times, it’s hard for me to know if it’s parodic or if it takes itself seriously with its scenes where everyone walks in line in slow motion, and the very modern feminist messages are definitely there. Men are portrayed as villains or idiots, and it also shows that women can get by without them if there is a male on their side who gets taken down. This is undoubtedly the response and revenge for centuries of male domination. So… this film is about revenge, but it IS also revenge!

What also fascinates me is that whether it’s a frustrated man or a woman who wants to show female power, we end up with the same kind of film! Ultimately, we see lots of highly sexualized young women, but in a male context, it’s just a perverse fantasy, whereas from a female perspective, it can be seen and taken as freedom, because “after all, we do what we want and too bad if people don’t like it!” But what exactly is the difference???

Another important question: how many women are fighting against rape culture (unfortunately still too prevalent) while showing, or even advocating, the opposite? This film had the elements to do something interesting, but it botched everything. It’s a kind of Ocean’s 11, but with strippers, breasts, and a dance number meant to be a tribute to Eyes Wide Shut, while remaining very bland and boring.

They could have called it Ocean’s 69! I don’t know how this film about a heist in a strip club, reminiscent of the 1980s, could have been produced by Paramount+!!!

There’s only one word to describe this movie: BOOOOOOBS or BOOBIIIIIES !

It could have been so good! If I had to sum it up in just a few words, I’d say: entertaining, failed, familiar, ridiculous, superficial, frivolous, pathetic.

Good casting, well acted… but avoid it!