# Most degrading performance by a woman in a movie? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 23, 2007, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286 "2007-04-23T09:01:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Subterraneanus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Subterraneanus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Subterraneanus)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/21 "2007-04-23T17:44:18Z")
Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance in _Last Exit to Brooklyn_ is up there. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/22 "2007-04-23T17:56:08Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] Also to humans, mammals, carbon based lifeforms, and the sidereal universe in general. Holy _fuck_ that was a bad movie. [/QUOTE] One of their writers and actors (Paul Chaplin) said it was the worst movie they ever did. It has to be the sleaziest and slimiest as well. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/23 "2007-04-23T18:05:57Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Any one of a thousand performances where an attractive young actress played a character who is desperately attracted to the main character who was being played by an unattractive actor twenty or thirty years older than her. [/QUOTE] Oh, I don’t know, I thought _The Quiet Man_ was pretty good. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Wee\_Bairn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/90db22/32.png) [@Wee\_Bairn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wee_Bairn)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/24 "2007-04-23T18:09:44Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Any one of a thousand performances where an attractive young actress played a character who is desperately attracted to the main character who was being played by an unattractive actor twenty or thirty years older than her. [/QUOTE] Good one- this would include at least one actress in the last 20 or so Woody Allen movies. ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/25 "2007-04-23T18:28:26Z")
[QUOTE=Typo Knig] I have to raise an exception on Denise Richards. I went to grad school (in physics) with a woman who looks a lot like her. I am, therefore, probably the only male who found Denise Richards’ performance as Dr. Christmas Jones - Nuclear Physicist - credible. [/QUOTE] Was she as inarticulate and airheaded as Richards was in the film? Because it wasn’t her looks that destroyed her credibility; it was her complete failure in the acting department. ---
**Author:** ![Marlitharn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/779978/32.png) [@Marlitharn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlitharn)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/26 "2007-04-23T18:41:24Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Any one of a thousand performances where an attractive young actress played a character who is desperately attracted to the main character who was being played by an unattractive actor twenty or thirty years older than her. [/QUOTE] I _liked_ **Sabrina**. **Daddy Long-legs** , on the other hand… ---
**Author:** ![saoirse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/27 "2007-04-23T18:59:58Z")
[QUOTE=Priceguy] I tried, but didn’t see any misogyny in _Dogville_. Now, _Manderlay_, that was nasty. [/QUOTE] Both _Dogville_ and \* Breaking the Waves\* are just excuses for Von Trier to have women horribly and repeatedly abused. The actual dirty work is always done by “those people,” characters in the movie that Von Trier disapproves of. Don’t believe for a moment that it’s anything other than his hangup. I think he’s a bad director and a bad human being. He should at least own up to his own misogyny, instead of trying to palm it off on other people. ---
**Author:** ![lovelybean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/94ad74/32.png) [@lovelybean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lovelybean)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/28 "2007-04-23T19:04:58Z")
[QUOTE=pinkfreud] I vote for Edith Massey as Edie the Egg Lady in John Waters’ _Pink Flamingos_ (though I would vote for Divine, in the same movie, if the definition of ‘woman’ was a generous one). [/QUOTE] She gets my vote too! Unless we count how Divine degrades herself for the rich couple in Female Trouble. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/29 "2007-04-23T19:18:46Z")
How about those slasher flicks Bette Davis & Joan Crawford made in the 60’s because it was the only work they could get? ---
**Author:** ![lovelybean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/94ad74/32.png) [@lovelybean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lovelybean)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/30 "2007-04-23T19:38:30Z")
[QUOTE=Slithy Tove] How about those slasher flicks Bette Davis & Joan Crawford made in the 60’s because it was the only work they could get? [/QUOTE] You mean you don’t think \*\*Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte \*\* is some of Bette Davis’s best work? ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/31 "2007-04-23T23:39:08Z")
_Showgirl_ was without a doubt the most degrading stuff I’ve seen in a really long time- and that includes any mainstream porn I may have watched. It was completely sickening. That woman must have reaaaaallllly needed a paycheck to act those scenes. I am friends with the “A” Camera/Steadicam Op on that show and he described it as the worst period of time in his entire career. -gag- Cartooniverse ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/32 "2007-04-23T23:41:25Z")
The rape victim in _A Clockwork Orange_ (is she murdered as well?) (I left after he slapped her). ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/33 "2007-04-23T23:53:08Z")
Marilyn Burns wasn’t _horribly_ degraded in **The Texas Chain Saw Massacre** (well, it was 1974), though she wasn’t treated that well on set – that rag stuffed in her mouth during the infamous dinner scene was a real, random grease-stained cloth from a crew member. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2007, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/34 "2007-04-23T23:53:23Z")
[QUOTE=fessie] The rape victim in _A Clockwork Orange_ [/QUOTE] Could you be more specific? ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/35 "2007-04-24T00:41:02Z")
So, um, if somebody was … hypothetically, of course … willing to expose themselves to the degradation of _Requiem for a Dream_, would the Director’s Cut be the way to go or the original theatrical cut? ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/36 "2007-04-24T02:24:31Z")
[QUOTE=fessie] The rape victim in _A Clockwork Orange_ (is she murdered as well?) (I left after he slapped her). [/QUOTE] I believe the specific rape is the one that occurs at **Home** house. The writer, his young wife. Yes, she dies of her wounds and the writer is permanently wheelchair-bound. That event occurred in the life of the author, Anthony Burgess. Then again, it might be a reference to the rape of the Cat Lady and her murder with the giant white phallus sculpture. I believe in both scenes, the victims died. Cartooniverse ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/37 "2007-04-24T02:28:08Z")
I believe it was the Home house, as described above. ---
**Author:** ![Survey1215](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecb155/32.png) [@Survey1215](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Survey1215)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/38 "2007-04-24T02:29:01Z")
Not sure if this is what the OP is looking for but what about Chloe Sevigny’s actual oral acrobatics in ‘The Brown Bunny’? Especially with a cretin like Vincent Gallo. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/39 "2007-04-24T02:52:36Z")
[QUOTE=KneadToKnow] So, um, if somebody was … hypothetically, of course … willing to expose themselves to the degradation of _Requiem for a Dream_, would the Director’s Cut be the way to go or the original theatrical cut? [/QUOTE] Director’s cut. And this is the movie I immediately thought of as well. ---
**Author:** ![lisacurl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/41988e/32.png) [@lisacurl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisacurl)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286/40 "2007-04-24T03:36:01Z")
[QUOTE=Cartooniverse] I believe the specific rape is the one that occurs at **Home** house. The writer, his young wife. Yes, she dies of her wounds and the writer is permanently wheelchair-bound. That event occurred in the life of the author, Anthony Burgess. [/QUOTE] What event? Are you saying Burgess knew someone to which something similar happened? Do you have a cite for this, because that sounds very apocryphal. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-degrading-performance-by-a-woman-in-a-movie/401286.md?page=3)