Written by Robert Scucci | Published
Not all brand mashups are created equal, and in 2014 Naked After Midnight (or After Midnight in other markets) is the most confusing I've come across so far. The film is about a renegade who is killed at his workplace, the Candy Cat Club, and his sister-in-law who wears a wig and pretends to be an outside dancer to avenge her death. Along the way, she is seduced by her producer and therapist, both of whom want to take their one-sided relationship with her back to the next level. Unfortunately for them, he is too busy with his ill-conceived revenge scheme to please their love.
The whole thing plays out like a bad episode of Law & Order: SVUbut with more melodrama and sexual exploitation Showgirls. In better hands, Naked After Midnight It could have made for a solid comedy or comedy film, but it leans too far into the absurd, stripping the film of any semblance of appeal. Still, it's too bad, for reasons I'll get into, that it's worth a watch if you're a masochist like me and just want to watch the world burn.
News Anchor By Night, Revenge Stripper By … And By Night?
Naked After Midnight follows Constance (Catherine Annette), who learns of the murder of her stripper sister, Ann (Jeneta St. Clair), while reading the teleprompter at her news network job. Devastated by the news, her suspiciously supportive boss, John (Tim Abell), allows her to take time off to create. His psychiatrist, Dr. Sam Hubbard (Richard Grieco), who is also suspiciously supportive (read: both men want him badly), gives him a shoulder to cry on.
However, Constance has a different plan in mind, and it involves avenging her sister's death. To do this, Constance, who I feel I need to remind you is a public figure, throws on a blonde wig and asks Candy Cat Club owner Rikki (Tawny Kitaen) for a job despite the fact that she can't dance. The other girls at the club, like Misty (Tiffany Tynes), Britney (Cindy Lucas), and Zoey (Christine Nguyen), don't take well to the idea of a new stripper getting cut in their lounge. None of them seem separated or concerned that Ann, a close colleague of theirs the day before, was killed in the parking lot outside their workplace. As all this happens, Constance is overwhelmed by the sweat of her dead sister, who just comes and goes as she pleases.
One of the club's regulars, Julian (Bobby Rice), sees Constance on his news program and wants to help with the mystery. Constance is too busy talking to her hospitalized sister, Sasha (Madison Ivy), about her revenge plot, though, despite the fact that she's in a coma and has absolutely no idea what Constance is saying. As Constance digs deeper into the world of exotic dance, she discovers some truths she's not ready for, making her even more unfocused in her quest to find out who killed her sister and return the favor.
Where do I start?
If Naked After Midnight had better acting, better production values, better screenplay, and better direction, it would be a solid movie. If you were to scan that last sentence with a sarcasm detector a la Comic Book Guy it pops up The Simpsonsthe machine would explode in your hands. Every line of dialogue between the narrators sounds ripped straight from the The girls said playbook, but without any witty or silly charm. Everyone is incredibly mean here except for Rikki, who takes care of her girls and always packs heat into her clutch bag.
The odd love triangle between Constance and her two persistent male suitors is laughable because it basically boils down to two elderly people repeatedly saying, “Come, you can talk to me, baby,” to a woman who has absolutely no romantic interest in either of them. The twist ending, which I honestly didn't see coming, is beyond ridiculous and so far out of left field that I questioned my sanity for a second. However, when I looked back at everything that happened before that, I came to the conclusion that it wasn't me. It's a silent movie.
Worst of all, however, is the Candy Cat Club itself, which doesn't seem to have more than five customers inside. The stripper-to-customer ratio is basically one to one, and I have reason to believe this comes down to budget constraints. Most of the unintentional humor comes from every single dancer fighting for turf and tips as if a handful of men in the club have enough dollar bills to go around. The funny thing is that they make it rain somehow, which made me wonder what these guys do for a living because they show up every night.
All about Naked After Midnight it's confusing. It's supposed to be a revenge story, but once you get to the reveal, that premise is completely undermined, making the whole build feel pointless. At the same time, it's so unintentionally funny that you should watch it if you're looking for something crazy to take your mind off things. But be warned: there's a lot of nudity here, and no one really knows how to dance, which makes everything even more difficult.
Naked AFTER MIDNIGHT
From this writing, you can broadcast Naked After Midnight free on Tubi. You'll need commercial breaks for this one, but you'll laugh a few times too.
