‘American Gigolo’
This season of Karina Longworth’s essential You Must Remember This podcast is centered around the “Erotic 80s,” and the season’s third episode trains its gaze upon American Gigolo, the 1980 neo-noir that turned Richard Gere from a devastatingly handsome piece of eye candy into a full-fledged movie star. Gere stars here as Julian, an Armani-clad male escort and all-time, first ballot Hall of Fame smokeshow (sorry for objectifying him like this, but director Paul Schrader made it impossible not to!). Gere caters primarily to high net worth clientele — he’s a a far cry from Fred Garvin, Male Prostitute — but finds himself on the wrong side of the power imbalance as he’s framed for a murder after agreeing to a particularly kinky trick. It’s one of the most influential movies of the ’80s, scored with Giorgio Moroder’s pulsating synths, and establishes an aesthetic that ultimately inspired everything from Less Than Zero to 9 1/2 Weeks.