You're Trying to Seduce Me, Aren't You? - Nomi

"It doesn't suck."

And it doesn't get much trashier than this! Beautiful dancer Nomi wants to make it big in Vegas. Though tough and talented, she isn't quite mature, realistic, or sophisticated enough for the big time yet. Her first foray into the city of sin starts out hopeful: a free ride when stuck on the desert outskirts of the strip; a lucky strike on the slot machine. Yet just as soon as she's winning, she is losing, finding herself penniless, robbed and almost killed.

Nomi appears to have something though and people are willing to give her a chance. Her rescuer takes pity on her and in no time at all they are living together and best friends.

Nomi takes liberties with her boss, turning up late to work, or not at all, and though clearly at the end of his tether with her, he won't let her go.

Through starting a fight in a club and getting the bouncer fired, even he still finds her intriguing enough to pursue her further.

Nomi will experience her fair share of opportunities from various people, but she'll often follow the shinier opportunities given by those with more influence.

The connections she makes do eventually pay off for her, but it isn't without a cost. Throughout the film she is constantly battling between her love and passion for dance, and the shame she holds over a past life of prostitution. The work she is offered allows her to dance, but considering the town she is in, the lines are blurred with what is exercising her craft and what is sex work. Though she doesn't mind dancing nude and sexually as a showgirl, the advances she receives and the compromises she has to make test her morals.

Nomi never tries to claw her way to the top, but is naive enough to take people at their word. Everyone around her giving her a chance seems to want to make it conditional and those conditions often revolve around her being required to fuck her way (or fuck over people) to the top.

Despite her street girl rough and toughness, we never feel animosity towards Nomi and she never fully becomes a starry eyed monster. We're rooting for her, but she's just not in the right place to turn her life around.

Her relationship with show boss Zack has a certain genuiness to it, she is attracted to and charmed by him, delighting in the opportunities he gives her, but perhaps innocently mistakes them for being something more than just another one of his conquests. Even her elimination of rival Crystal by pushing her down a flight of stairs comes more from a place of unrestrained rage, than deviousness. You can take the girl out the street, but not the street out of the girl.

Whilst having eventually gotten the top spot in the show and all the glory that comes with it, she soon sees through the darkness of Vegas. When her best friend is visciously raped at a lavish party held by the show producers, Nomi isn't going to stand for a payout of hush money and the attacker not facing justice. She decides to take her last performance in Vegas by using those tough girl skills and beats the hell out of him, and fittingly, in quite a choreographed way!

Nomi reel on Instagram