The movie that sent Pamela Anderson into Hollywood exile: “It wasn’t supposed to turn out like it did”
From the moment she arrived, the world took the utmost pleasure in weaponising Pamela Anderson’s beauty and using it against her.
After finding success as a model, Anderson made her screen debut in Home Improvement. She stayed for just two seasons before taking up the role of CJ Parker in Baywatch. Somewhere between those two projects, she became the fantasy obsession of countless TV fans worldwide.
Shortly after making her big-screen debut in Good Cop Bad Cop, Anderson met Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee. A couple of years later, two films were released that would alter the course of Anderson’s career. In 1996, she appeared on numerous talk shows to promote her upcoming film Barb Wire.
However, it quickly became apparent that all anyone was interested in was Stolen Honeymoon, the unauthorised sex tape stolen from Pam and Tommy’s home. Porn studio owner Milton Ingley made copies of the tape and destroyed the original before passing it over to Louie Peraino, who ran the adult video production company Arrow Productions. Peraino gave Ingley £50,000 to distribute the tape and release it on the internet.
When Barb Wire opened in cinemas, critics seized upon the film in the same way the public had seized upon Stolen Honeymoon: using it to reduce Anderson to her cup size. The much-maligned action-comedy stars Anderson as a nightclub owner/mercenary/stripper in the year 2017. Fascist America is in the midst of its second civil war (who said high-camp can’t be prescient?), and Barb lives in one of its last free cities. When a scientist wanders into her establishment, she finds herself caught up in a top-secret government plot involving biological weapons.
Barb Wire was torn to shreds, and yet director David Hogan got off scot-free. Rather than focusing on the film’s lazy, nonsensical script and David Hogan’s sloppy direction, many critics laid the blame on Anderson, who was readily mocked for being unable to contain her breasts. Others were more clairvoyant.
During a conversation with Interview Magazine, Anderson explained: “It wasn’t supposed to turn out like it did.” It’s a tale as old as time, as Anderson was sold a dream that couldn’t be fulfilled. “When I saw the comic book the movie’s based on, I thought, oh, my God, she’s on a motorcycle in leather, crazy, with big hair, glamorous. This is hysterical. It’s totally me.”
The movie was set to me something very different: “It was going to be a dark comedy, real cartoony. Then, before going into production, I went to Cannes to promote it, got all this attention, and Polygram, the movie’s backer, went, ‘Maybe this is bigger than we thought’”
Focusing on the money that could be made, and with Anderosn at the helm, it felt like a box office smash on the cards: “They began changing it, trying to make it much more commercial. More action, less humour, a different director. They changed the script six million times. I wound up going against my instincts, so it was really difficult for me. I wanted to keep it tongue-in-cheek, but it didn’t work out that way. All the irony was gone. Still, there’s this little cult of different people who love that movie. I mean, I know a lot of drag queens who dress up like Barb Wire.”
Thankfully, it wouldn’t be the only time Anderson was able to get back on the big screen. In recent years, Anderson has jumped back into acting, in two areas one might not have expected her to pop up in. The incredible and brutal The Last Showgirl was triumphant, but her most recent venture in the reboot of Naked Gun is a movie that might change her acting career as we know it.
