Today marks the 20th anniversary of one of the most notorious movie moments of the ’90s.
No, not the white-knuckle D-Day invasion sequence fromSaving Private Ryan.
Or the Busby Berkeley bowling dream fantasia fromThe Big Lebowski.
Credit: Everett Collection
Or the stuck-in-a-trunk flirtation between George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez inOut of Sight.
It all begins with the folks both behind and in front of the camera.
In other words, this was hardly anyone’s idea of a Hollywood dream team.
Her mother, played by Theresa Russell, is a bored and blowsy, vodka-swilling maneater.
It’s kissing-cousins to another humid, racy Florida neo-noir,Body Heat.
Richards has a crush on Dillon and hates Campbell.
Dillon has a weakness for pretty young things and seems doomed from the get-go.
And Campbell, well, she just seems to hate everyone.
But the trio’s lives are about to intersect through that great equalizer: sin.
Dillon is quickly painted as a made-to-order patsy after the two girls accuse the popular teacher of rape.
The three later meet at a seedy motel room to celebrate their successful scheme.
Plans for the trio’s future are discussed.
Smoldering looks are exchanged.
Composer George S. Clinton fires up the silk-sheets sax on the soundtrack.
And off comes Richards' top.
In 1998 this was pretty torrid stuff.
Hell, in 2018, it’s pretty torrid stuff, especially for a big-studio release.
It may not exactly rise to the transgressive heights ofLast Tango in ParisorBlue is the Warmest Color.
The first stage of an image makeover that never quite took offor even made very far down the runway.
Within four years she would be Mrs. Charlie Sheen.
As a rule, movies likeWild Thingsfight an uphill battle with critics would want to seem above titillation.
Either you’re a connoisseur of melodramatic comic vulgarity, or you’re not.
You know who you are.
I don’t want to get any postcards telling me this movie is in bad taste.
I’m warning you: It is in bad taste.
Bad taste elevated to the level of demented sleaze."
It currently has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 64 percent.
It deserves to be higher.
Wild Thingswould end up making $56 million at the box officenearly triple its budget.
But its shadow extends beyond mere dollars and cents.
It’s a film that has cemented its place in sex-in-cinema history, spawning three direct-to-DVD sequels.
Granted, they’re all garbage.
In 2004, an “Uncut” version ofWild Thingswas released on DVD.
And while that cut restores several excised scenes, few of them add to the pulse-quickening quotient.
They’re mostly exposition.
For her part, Campbell had a no-nudity clause in her contract and exercised it.
Oh, and that ubiquitous Champagne bottle?
In the script, the prop was written as a dildo.
Twenty years later,Wild Thingsremains fun, giddy trash.
Would you want to watch it over Thanksgiving with your parents next to you on the sofa?
But it is fantastically naughty fun.
Focus all you want on the infamous three-way scene, butWild Thingsis more than just those four minutes.
It’s a movie ripe for rediscovery, preferably with a bottle of Champagne in hand.
